l??fe:.  '^ 


it:=^. - 


i^' 


»*. 


Kmr 


/«'*;■'•■'■■'-• 


ri», 


f* 


fc-..v 


THE  LIBRARIES 


AUTOBIOGRAPHY 


OF 


WILLIAM   WOOD 


Vol.  II 


«'.  i ; 


P^rihUd  for  P^n'aU';Gifeulation 


NEW  YORK 

J.  S.  BABCOCK,  Publisher,  58  Cedar  Street 
1895 


/  '  V      u     J      y     ] 


THE   MERSHON   COMPANY   PRESS, 
RAHWAV,    N.   J. 


V7  >^-/i> 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.    Visit  to  Mobile i 

II.     Journey  to  Fort  Smith,  Ark.,  to  Inspect  our  Lands  and 

Ascertain  their  Value,  9 

III.  Return  from  Fort  Smith  to  New  Orleans,  and  Journey  up 

the  Red  River, 31 

IV.  Return  Journey  to  New  York  with  my  Family,  Arriving 

June  25,  1845,  46 

V.     The  last  Summer  of  my  Life  with  Harriet  in  New  York,      65 
VI.     On  my  Way  to  New  Orleans,  December,  1845,       .        .        .81 
VII.     Journey  to  New  Orleans  Concluded,  Arriving  there  De- 
cembers!, T845, ^^4 

VIII.     Opening  of  1846 — The  Saddest  Year  of  my  Life — Letters 

BETWEEN  Me  in  NeW  ORLEANS  AND    MY  WiFE  IN  NeW  YORK,       I45 

IX.     Wm.  W.  in  New  Orleans,  and  H.  A.  W.  in  New  York,  Dis- 
cussing A  Future  which  God   Decided  far  Otherwise 

THAN  They  Anticipated, 157 

X.     Correspondence  Continued — Winter  of  1846,  .        .         173 

XL     Correspondence  Continued  during  W.  W.'s  Stay  in  New 

Orleans  in  1846,  204 

XII.     Correspondence  Continued, 221 

XIII.     Ending  with  the  Last  Letter  ever  Written  by  Wm.  W.  to 

H.  A.  W.,  242 

XIV.     My  Wife  Dies, 249 

XV.     Contains  Harriet's  Last  Counsels  to  Me,  as  Expressed  in 

her  Will, 261 

XVI.     Spring  and  Early  Summer  of  1846  in  New  York  and  New 

Brighton,  S.  L, 270 

XVII.     Summer  of  1846— I  Return  Alone  to  England,  and  in  the 

Autumn  Come  back  to  Make  my  Home  in  New  York,       .     279 


IV 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  PAGE 

XVIII.     A  New  Beginning  of  Life— A  Home  in  New  York  and  a 

Second  Wife, 289 

XIX.     Journey  to  Europe  in  1852 298 

XX.     Another  Trip  to  England — I  Place  Most  of  my  Children 

BY  MY  First  Wife  at  Boarding  Schools  in  Various  Places,     310 
XXI.     The  Disastrous  Year  1857,  ......         320 

XXII.     Events  of  the  Civil  War, 328 

XXIII.  Dissolution  of  Partnership  with  my   Uncles,  and  Events 

OF  Home  Life  During  the  First  Year  of  the  War,      .         341 

XXIV.  I  Enter  the  British  and  American  Exchange  Banking  Cor- 

poration, Limited,  as  Manager,  August  24, 1863 — Question 
OF  the  Change  of  Name  of  the  "Dutch    Reformed  " 

Church  Debated, 347 

XXV.     I  Wind  up  the  Affairs  of  the  Bank  and  end  my  Commercial 
Life — I  Begin  a  New  Career  of  Work  in  the  Board  of 
Education,  Giving  my  Life's  Services  to  my  Adopted  City,    360 
XXVI.     Organization  of  the  Girls'  Normal  School  and  of  the  De- 
partment OF  Docks, .         369 

XXVII.  An  Unfinished  Chapter,  Telling  of  Work  in  the  Depart- 
ment OF  Docks  and  Board  of  Education — The  Autobiog- 
raphy Ending  Abruptly  with  a  few  Lines  Written  May 

23,  1894, 376 

Continuation  by  Mrs.  Elizabeth  D.  Kane, 385 

Appendix,  513 


AUTOBIOGRAPHY 


OF 


WILLIAM    WOOD. 


CHAPTER    I. 

VISIT    TO    MOBILE. 

On  my  return  from  Dalae  (Mr.  Pelton's),  I  remained  in  New 
Orleans,  looking  into  the  business  there,  and  decided  to  visit  Mobile 
to  see  our  agent  there,  who  was  also  a  debtor  of  ours.  I  think  he 
was  an  Englishman  by  birth,  and  besides  dabbling  in  cotton  had,  I 
think,  a  foundry.  On  my  return  to  New  York  I  appointed  Isaac 
Bell,  Jr.,  as  our  agent  in  Mobile.  Isaac  Bell,  Jr.,  became  a  member 
of  the  House  of  Representatives  of  Alabama,  and  long  years  after- 
ward held  many  municipal  offices  in  New  York.  Among  others  he 
was  Commissioner  of  Education  with  me  for  many  years  between 
1869  and  1888. 

I  left  New  Orleans  for  Mobile  on  March  3,  1845,  and  wrote  the 
following  letters  to  my  beloved  wife  : 

"  Steamer  James  L.  Day,  Lake  Pontchartrain, 

"  March  3,  1485. 
**  My  Dearest  Harriet  : 

'*  The  train  en  route  for  Mobile  did  not  start  till  2.30  p.  m.  or  later. 
We  took  about  twenty-five  minutes  to  reach  the  lake.  Half  of  the 
way  the  road  lies  through  a  swamp,  with  the  trees  literally  '  growing 
oot  o'  the  water.'  Arrived  at  the  lake  we  were  detained  till  5  p.  m. 
by  the  steamer  taking  in  cargo.  While  lying  at  the  wharf  we  had 
our  dinner  on  board,  which  was,  as  usual  on  board  the  steamers,  very 
good.  A  Frenchman  named  Legrand,  who  has  some  sort  of  manu- 
factory in  Mexico,  but  comes  himself  from  Champagne,  has  taken  a 


2  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

sort  of  fancy  to  me,  having  taken  me  he  said,  ''Four  un  Frangais,' 
and  applying  to  me  to  help  him  make  known  his  wants  as  to  a 
berth,  etc.  He  has  been  jabbering  away  to  me  for  the  last  two 
hours,  and  I  speaking  all  sorts  of  grammar  to  him,  or  rather  no 
grammar  at  all.  I  told  him,  however,  I  had  a  daughter  who  spoke 
French  trh  Men.  We  are  now  fairly  out  in  the  lake,  which  looks 
mighty  like  the  sea,  and  one  might  be  seasick  on  it  well  enough  if 
it  blew  hard.  I  expect  a  breeze  during  the  night,  as  we  go  some 
twenty-five  miles  out  to  sea,  I  find  ;  or  rather,  I  should  say,  we  go 
that  distance  on  the  sea.  Who  should  I  meet  at  the  railway  station 
on  its  way  back  to  New  York,  but  the  '  cabin  pig  '  ?  It  looks  twice 
as  fat  as  it  did  before,  but  cleaner,  and  more  gentlemanly.  The 
company  on  board  is  not  specially  interesting.  Only  the  ladies  have 
staterooms.  The  gentlemen's  berths  are  all  round  the  cabin,  which 
is  a  bore  ;  so  I  shall  not  be  able   to  dress  comfortably. 

"  God  bless  you,  dear  one,  and  watch  over  you  and  my  dear  chil- 
dren. I  hope  dear  Johnnie  got  safely  home,  and  was  none  the 
worse  of  his  wetting.  I  hope  to  finish  this  in  Mobile,  and  if  I  can 
manage  it,  I  believe  I  will  set  to  and  write  to  Anna  this  evening,  in 
reply  to  her  letter,  so  as  not  to  let  it  interfere  with  my  business  hours 
when  I  return.     Good-night,  dearest. 

"  March  4. — We  had  a  good  passage  during  the  night,  and  at  6 
A.  M.  we  were  within  thirty-five  miles  of  Mobile,  but  finding  there 
was  not  sufficient  depth  of  water  to  go  by  the  inner  passage,  we  had 
to  turn  back  nearly  twenty  miles,  and  go  out  to  sea,  where  we  had  a 
pretty  breeze.  The  mail  will  be  closed  before  we  reach  Mobile, 
which  we  shall  probably  do  about  i  p.  M.  I  will  try  and  get  this 
put  on  board  the  steamer,  which  will  be  leaving  for  New  Orleans 
just  as  we  arrive.  We  are  now  standing  up  Mobile  Bay  with  a 
fair  wind.  God  bless  you,  and  my  dear  children  !  I  inclose  the 
times   of  departure  of  the  Pontchartrain  rail  cars. 

"  Ever  thine  own  "  Wm,  W." 

"Mobile,  March  4,  1845. 
"  My  Beloved  Wife  : 

"  I  arrived  here  about  i  p.  m.  to-day,  and  put  a  letter  for  you  in 
the  bag  of  the  steamer  Creole,  which  was  lying  at  the  wharf  ready 
to  start  for  New  Orleans.     It  continued  to  blow  very  hard   after  I 


VISIT   TO    MOBILE.  3 

closed  my  letter  to  you  this  morning,  and,  although  not  practically 
sick,  I  have  felt  squeamish  all  day  in  consequence  of  the  tossing. 
The  wind  has  now  gone  down  and  this  is  a  beautiful,  cool,  clear 
evening.  I  am  staying  at  the  Mansion  House  Hotel,  as  far  as  board 
goes,  but  they  had  no  good  bedroom,  so  they  sent  me  to  a  detached 
house  of  theirs  called  the  Eutaw  Hotel  ('  a  nice  little  hotel  called 
the  Wardie  Hotel,'  as  J.  Walter  wrote  in  his  first  letter  from  Edin- 
burgh),"which  has  only  sleeping  apartments  and  is  quiet.  My  room 
is  about  the  size  of  our  stateroom  in  the  Queen  of  the  JVesf,  or  a 
little  bigger,  and  enters  from  a  gallery  running  round  an  interior 
court.  The  Frenchman  is  next  door  to  me,  and  it  does  not  look  as 
if  there  were  above  one  or  two  more  in  the  house.  This  is  but  a 
small  place  compared  with  New  Orleans,  but  has  one  handsome  wide 
street,  and  some  others  good  enough  and  wide  enough.  It  is  more 
like  Flushing  or  some  of  those  Long  Island  places  than  New 
Orleans,  and,  although  pretty  flat,  the  ground  does  not  actually  fall 
away  as  it  recedes  from  the  river,  but  rather  rises,  although  scarcely 
perceptibly.  The  Mansion  House  is  a  great  unfinished-looking 
American  hotel.  Large  tobacco-smelling,  spirituous,  spitty  bar- 
room, etc.,  etc.  Meals  in  an  immense  hall,  low  in  the  roof.  Three 
ranges  of  tables — ladies,  a  few,  at  the  upper  end  of  one  ;  I  sit  near 
them.  Oyster  gumbo  soup,  wild  turkey,  meringue,  and  apple  tart 
constituted  my  dinner  to-day.  Pretty  well  for  a  squeamish  man. 
I  have  not  seen  my  debtor  yet,  but  have  had  two  consultations  with 
lawyers  about  my  business.  I  think  of  writing  to  John  to-night,  so 
God  bless  you,  dear  one,  and  my  darling  children  !  I  have  turned 
over  two  pages,  goose  as  I  am. 

"  March  5,  1845.  This  is  a  beautiful  day,  clear  and  cool.  I  had 
a  sound  sleep.  Rose  at  half  past  six,  read  my  Bible  and  your  two 
letters  of  advice,  and  had  '  a  time  of  refreshing  from  the  Lord.'  Oh! 
if  I  could  only  always  bear  in  mind  that  '  our  times  are  in  his  hand.' 
There  I  was  interrupted  by  a  call  from  Mr.  Alderson,  and  have  been 
with  him  for  about  two  hours,  looking  into  his  books,  etc.,  etc.,  and 
got  over  a  very  disagreeable  business  really  pretty  pleasantly,  and  I 
hope  also  to  some  purpose.  I  shall  not  be  able  to  leave  this  before 
Friday,  but  hope  to  do  so  then.  I  am  asked  to  dine  with  Mr.  Aider- 
son  to-morrow,  which  it  is  my  present  intention  to  do.  But  I  must 
close,  having  left  myself  no  time  to  say  more.     God  bless  you,  my 


4  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

dearest  one!     I  will   not   write  again  before  my  return.     Kind  love 
to  my  dear  children. 

"  Ever  thine  own 

"Wm.W." 

"Mobile,  March  6,  1845. 
*'  My  Dearest  H.: 

"  It  was  very  stupid  in  me  not  to  ask  you  to  write  to  me  ;  I  took 
it  for  granted  that  you  would  do  so,  and  I  may  possibly  get  a  letter 
when  this  day's  mail  arrives,  or  to-morrow  before  I  leave,  as  I  intend 
to  do  at  1.30  p.  M.  I  dined  yesterday  with  Messrs.  Laird  and  Little- 
john,  correspondents  of  ours,  at  the  club,  and  after  dinner  walked 
some  three  miles  into  the  country  with  the  latter  to  a  Mr.  Hutch- 
eson's,  a  very  pretty  walk.  We  returned  in  the  evening,  a  fine,  star- 
light night.  To-day  I  am  to  drive  with  Mr.  Alderson,  who  lives 
near  Mr.  Hutcheson,  and  is  to  drive  me  out  and  send  me  in  in  the 
evening.  I  have  not  yet  given  up  the  Arkansas  trip  if  young  Davis, 
who  is,  I  suppose,  in  New  Orleans,  should  be  disposed  to  go. 

"  The  business  I  came  about  here  is,  all  things  considered,  quite 
in  as  bad  a  position  as  I  expected,  and  does  not  look  so  well  to-day 
as  it  did  yesterday.  However,  I  must  just  take  things  as  I  find 
them.  It  is  at  least  some  consolation  that  I  did  not  make  them 
what  they  are.     God  bless  you  and  my  dear  children! 

"  In  haste,  ever  thine  own 

"  Wm.  W." 

On  my  return  from  Mobile  I  made  my  arrangements  for  visiting 
our  lands  in  Arkansas.  These,  with  some  in  Mississippi,  amounted  to 
one  hundred  thousand  acres  and  were  bought  in  1836  or  1837,  by 
our  partners,  Mylne  and  Thomson,  without  any  authority  from  their 
partners,  and  it  was  some  years  after  the  purchase  before  our  head 
ofifice,  J.  &  A.  Dennistoun,  were  informed  of  the  purchase.  They 
(Mylne  and  Thomson)  had  interested  Samuel  Davis  of  Natchez,  and 
William  M.  Gwin,  then  United  States  Senator,  who  long  years  after 
was  also  of  the  two  first  United  States  senators  from  California,  and 
after  that  Duke  Gwin  of  Mexico  under  the  unfortunate  Emperor 
Maximilian.  Gwin  selected  the  lands,  and  he  had  an  opportunity 
from  his  official  position  of  selecting  the  very  best,  and  within  one 


VISIT   TO   MOBILE.  5 

year  from  the  purchase  the  one  hundred  thousand  acres  might  have 
been  sold  for  one  hundred  thousand  dollars  profit,  but  the  parties 
interested  stood  out  for  more,  and  missed  the  sale.  Meanwhile,  in 
1837  the  United  States  Bank  failed  and  depressed  all  values,  and 
forty  or  fifty  years  afterward  portions  of  these  lands  were  sold  as 
low  as  one  dollar  per  acre,  the  price  paid  to  the  United  States  for 
them  having  been  one  dollar  and  a  quarter  per  acre.  William  M. 
Gwin  never  paid  anything  for  his  one-third.  Davis  did  pay  some 
thousands  of  dollars,  but  gave  up  his  share  for  ten  thousand  dollars 
cash,  and  eventually  A.  &  J.  D.  &  Co.  were  saddled  with  the  whole 
of  these  lands,  Gwin  and  Davis  giving  up  their  shares.  At  first 
Mylne  and  Thomson's  one-third  was  held  in  the  name  of  our  then 
lawyer,  John  Slidell,  the  well-known  senator  of  the  United  States, 
who  was  subsequently  rebel  agent  captured  out  of  a  British  packet 
along  with  Mason,  both  having  to  be  given  up  by  the  United  States 
to  Great  Britain. 

As  already  stated,  John  Pelton  had  agreed  to  go  with  me  to  Arkan- 
sas as  an  expert  in  the  value  of  lands.  We  were  to  be  joined  at 
Natchez  on  our  way  to  Arkansas  by  young  Davis,  the  son  of  Samuel, 
as  representing  his  father's  interest  in  the  lands,  which,  by  the  way, 
were  all  confiscated  by  the  rebel  government  as  belonging  to  alien 
enemies  ;  but  of  course  after  the  peace  in  1865  they  were  all 
restored  to  us.  After  I  became  a  citizen  in  1852  they  were  trans- 
ferred from  John  Slidell's  name  to  mine.  It  will  be  seen  from  these 
remarks  that  the  "  Arkansas  lands  "  were  quite  an  important  asset, 
and  I  was  determined  to  know  all  about  them  before  I  returned 
home,  and  so  I  started  for  Arkansas  on  April  19,  1845,  in  the  fine 
steamer  Arkansas  No.  4.  This  curious  name  indicated  that  three 
previous  steamers  of  the  same  name  had  either  been  blown  up  or 
sunk — not  a  very  pleasant  lookout  for  No.  4. 

The  following  beautiful  letter  was  written  by  Harriet,  and  given 
to  me  as  I  was  going  to  start  in  the  steamboat  Arkansas  No.  4  for  Lit- 
tle Rock,  Ark.  I  was  not  to  read  it  until  after  I  got  on  board.  It 
is  addressed  in  Harriet's  handwriting  outside  :  "  A  budget  from  a 
bruised,  but,  thanks  be  to  God,  not  a  broken.,  heart,  faint,  yet 
pursuing." 


6  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF     WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  New  Orleans,  March  19,  1845. 
"  My  Precious  Husband  : 

"  When  you  read  this,  you  will  be  beyond  the  reach  of  my  voice, 
and  for  a  long  space  of  time  hidden  from  my  sight,  perhaps  forever  ! 
O  God,  let  it  not  be  so,  but  restore  us  to  each  other  in  thy  infinite 
mercy  and  goodness,  to  renewed  happiness  and  as  fellow-helpers  in 
every  good  word  and  work  !  I  want  to  say  a  few  words  again  to 
you,  my  beloved  Will,  as  God  directed  me  to  comfort  and  advise 
you  in  my  former  letters.  Bear  in  mind  that  you  are  no  adven- 
turer, and  you  have  not  set  out  in  search  of  adventures,  but,  as 
far  as  you  can  judge,  you  are  in  the  way  of  duty  ;  therefore,  for 
your  children's  and  your  wife's  sake,  go  no  further  than  is  strictly 
necessary,  and  do  not,  for  the  sake  of  showing  how  far  you  have 
ventured  and  inhere  you  have  been,  run  any  risk  to  your  person  or 
health,  or  be  inordinately  desirous  of  accomplishing  any  part  of  your 
journey  that  is  difficult  of  access  where  a  lesser  part  would  answer 
every  reasonable  purpose.  This  is  a  duty  you  owe  to  7fie  and  to 
your  children,  and  for  your  person  and  health  you  are  responsible 
to  God. 

"  You  have  great  energy  of  character  and  firmness  of  purpose,  and 
much,  very  much,  good  could  be  accomplished  by  you  for  God  and 
youx  fellozu- men.  These  are  talents  committed  to  your  care,  and  for 
the  right  use  of  them  you  must  have  a  sound  mind  in  a  sound  body  ; 
both  these  has  God  given  you,  therefore  do  not  waste  them  lightly, 
a.?,  for  both  you  must  give  an  account.  You  will  say  :  *  Yes,  I  know  it 
all,  and  I  am  an  unprofitable  servant.'  I  am  too  well  used  to  your 
language,  dear  Will,  not  to  know  what  you  would  say,  but  you  are 
mistaken — you  are  not  unprofitable,  and  have  not  been,  but  your 
energies  are  put  forth  too  strongly  in  07ie  direction,  namely,  in  the 
way  of  worldly  business,  and  this  is  wrong  when  it  is  so  engrossing 
as  to  block  up  all  the  other  paths  to  more  wholesome  usefulness. 
The  moderate  and  small,  safe  business  which  you  now  seem  likely 
to  enter  upon  will  give  you  more  leisure  to  *  redeem  the  time,'  and 
do  not,  I  pray  you,  be  tempted  to  deviate  from  this  course,  and 
advise  larger  measures  and  take  more  upon  yourself  to  do,  as  this  is 
your  besetting  sin,  believe  me,  and  with  these  loads  of  cares  you 
*  choke  the  word  and  it  becometh  unfruitful.'  With  regard  to  busi- 
ness and  your  success  here  in  New  Orleans,  do  not  despair.     Arnold 


VISIT   TO   MOBILE.  7 

says,  p.  117  :  'I  came  to  Rugby  full  of  plans  of  school  reform ' 

Here  Hill  came  in,  and  I  was  obliged  to  stop,  and  now  it  is 

"  March  20,  just  after  dinner,  and  Arnold  is  packed  up,  so 
that  I  cannot  finish  my  quotation,  but  get  the  book  and  mark 
what  he  (who  is  so  renowned  for  his  active  exertions  in  the 
university)  thought  of  his  unprofitableness.  I  am  much  hurried 
and  flustered  now,  having  forgotten  that  my  note  was  unfinished. 
I  had  intended  writing  when  I  came  home,  but  Mrs.  Rushton 
came  in  as  soon  as  I  returned  this  morning,  and  then  the  doc- 
tor's account  of  Powell,  and  Helen  and  Willie  being  unwell, 
gave  me  so  much  anxiety  that  it  put  it  out  of  my  head.  I  want 
you  to  read  the  35 th  chapter  of  Isaiah,  which  in  my  Bible 
is  marked  with  the  words  *  Mr.  Julien  '  in  lead  pencil  in  your  hand- 
writing. Do  you  not  remember  his  sermon  upon  it  ?  Note  the 
verses  I  have  marked  \w  your  Bible  for  you,  and  keep  up  your  heart 
by  thinking  what  God  has  done  for  you  since  you  last  heard  that 
sermon,  how  all  your  difficulties  seem  vanishing,  and  this  Arkansas 
trip  will  soon  be  over,  I  trust,  and  the  last  of  any  consequence  away 
from  me.  Read  on  to  the  38th  chapter  of  Isaiah  at  your 
leisure,  and  mark  God's  dealings  with  Hezekiah  and  the  King  of 
Assyria  ;  see  how  completely  we,  and  all  with  whom  we  have  to 
deal,  are  in  God's  hands — no  power,  no  might,  no  will,  no  wealth, 
can  prevail  against  him.  Read  the  28th  and  29th  verses  of  the  37th 
chapter  of  Isaiah,  and  then  read  the  whole  three  chapters  at  your 
leisure,  and  observe,  too,  that  Hezekiah,  whom  God  had  just  saved 
out  of  the  hands  of  his  enemies,  and  who  was  certainly  one  of  the 
chosen  of  God,  was  still  in  his  wisdom  afflicted  ;  the  38th  chapter 
begins,  '  In  these  days  was  Hezekiah  sick  unto  death.'  Now,  read  those 
comforting  chapters  in  John,  the  i6th  and  17th,  and  observe  the  verses 
I  have  marked  for  you,  and  I  will  get  Charlotte,  at  half  past  eight,  to 
read  the  same  chapters,  the  i6th  and  17th,  to  comfort  me,  for  /,  too, 
need  comfort,  and  perhaps  more  than  you,  my  beloved  one,  for  you, 
God  be  thanked,  seem  more  cheerful  and  happy  this  time.  You 
often  ask  me  to  pray  for  you,  and  I  ask  you  to  pray  for  me,  but  in 
these  chapters  we  see  that  our  Saviour  has  prayed  for  us  already, 
and  the  Father  has  heard  his  prayers,  for  he  prayed  for  his  own,  for 
those  whom  God  has  given  him,  and  we  have  the  earnest  of  the 
Spirit  that  we  are  his.     Oh,  then,  my  beloved  one,  and  my  poor 


8  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

sorrowing  heart,  too,  take  courage — greater  is  He  that  is  with  us 
than  they  that  are  against  us.  But  I  must  finish  and  not  lose  the  last 
few  moments  in  looking  at  and,  if  I  can,  speaking  to  you.  God 
forever  guard  and  keep  you  and  bless  you,  for  Jesus  Christ's 
sake  ! 

"  Your  own  poor 

"H." 


CHAPTER  II. 

JOURNEY     TO     FORT     SMITH,     ARK.,     TO     INSPECT     OUR     LANDS    AND 
ASCERTAIN    THEIR    VALUE. 

The  following  short  letter  was  written  in  our  office  in  New  Orleans 
after  I  had  said  farewell  to  Harriet,  and  had  gone  to  embark  on 
board  the  Arkansas  No.  4  for  Arkansas  : 

"  New  Orleans,  March  20,  1845. 
"  My  Beloved  Harriet  : 

"  Do  not  faint  or  be  discouraged  by  the  trials  by  which  you  are  at 
present  surrounded,  but  put  your  trust  in  your  Heavenly  Father, 
whose  eye  is  upon  you,  who  knows  all  your  wants  and  all  your  trou- 
bles, and  will  not  afflict  or  grieve  you  beyond  what  you  are  able  to 
bear.  Do  not  take  trouble  on  interest  about  the  dear  children  get- 
ting the  whooping  cough  ;  if  they  should,  it  is  generally  an  easy  com- 
plaint, and  particularly  so  in  spring.  Do,  under  all  circumstances, 
endeavor  to  keep  up  your  own  spirits  and  to  preserve  your  precious 
health  for  my  sake.  God  Almighty  protect  and  watch  over  you  and 
my  beloved  children,  and  restore  poor  Powell  to  health  ! 
"  Ever  your  own  attached, 

"  Wm.  W." 

"  Arkansas  No.  4,  River  Mississippi,  March  24,  1845. 
"  My  Beloved  Wife  : 

"  Here  I  am,  seated  at  a  table  in  the  cabin,  the  boat  fastened  to  the 
shore,  taking  in  wood,  and  everything  still  except  the  hissing  of  the 
steam  and  the  clink  of  dollars  jingling  on  the  table  of  a  party  which 
is  playing  cards  at  the  opposite  end  of  the  cabin.  There  are  a  great 
many  passengers,  I  should  say  about  sixty,  among  them  six  or  seven 
ladies,  one  or  two  of  whom  are  quite  ladylike.  They  appear  to  be 
returning  home  from  New  Orleans,  and  it  seems  this  is  such  a  favor- 
ite boat  that  the  Arkansas  people  always  try  to  wait  for  her.    We  did 

9 


lO  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD, 

not  leave  the  wharf  last  evening  until  exactly  half  past  seven,  just 
an  hour  to  a  minute  after  John  Walter  went  home.  At  half  past 
eight,  to  a  minute,  I  began  reading  the  i6th  and  17th  chapters  of 
John,  having  previously  twice  read  over  your  most  precious  note. 
Dear,  dear  Harriet,  how  unselfish  you  are,  and  how  selfish  and 
unworthy  of  you  I  feel  myself  to  be!  You,  amid  all  your  cares  and 
sorrows,  writing  me  such  words  of  comfort  and  consolation,  evincing 
so  much  knowledge  of  and  reliance  on  your  Bible,  while  I  only  sent 
you  those  few  hurried  lines,  written  when  I  went  back  to  the  office 
for  my  letters.  '  But  you  know  my  feelings,  Miss  Kane,'  and  I  trust 
in  God,  if  it  be  his  gracious  will  to  allow  us  to  meet  again  in  health 
and  happiness,  that  we  may  never  again  require  to  be  separated  for  any 
length  of  time,  for  it  is  killing  work.  Do  try,  my  beloved  one,  and 
keep  up  your  spirits,  and  endeavor  to  cast  all  your  care  upon  God, 
knowing  that  he  will  care  for  you  and  will  watch  over  you  and  me 
and  our  dear  children.  I  read  '  Arnold '  last  night  about  ten,  and 
then  went  to  bed  and  prayed  fervently  for  you,  as  I  did  whenever  I 
awoke  in  the  night.  I  awoke  permanently  about  5  a.  m.  and  recol- 
lected, to  my  dismay,  that  I  had  not  told  the  captain  to  stop  at  Don- 
aldsonville,  where  I  expected  Mr.  Pelton  to  join  me,  and  if  we  had 
been  going  on  all  night,  we  must  have  passed  it  about  i  a.  m.  How- 
ever, I  knew  we  must  have  stopped  once  or  twice  during  the  night, 
for  the  cessation  of  the  boat's  motion  had  waked  me,  so  I  pulled  on 
my  trousers  and  stockings  and  my  greatcoat  and  went  on  deck  and 
asked  the  pilot  if  we  had  passed  Donaldsonville.  To  my  great 
relief,  he  said  we  had  not  ;  in  fact,  we  did  not  reach  it  until  8  a.  m., 
and  there,  sure  enough,  Mr.  Pelton  joined  us,  which  I  know  will  be  a 
comfort  to  you,  and  it  was  more  on  your  account  than  on  my  own 
that  I  felt  annoyed  when  I  supposed  we  had  passed  Donaldsonville 
without  stopping,  and  I  also  felt  that  it  would  have  looked  very  care- 
less and  inattentive  to  Pelton  if  we  had  passed  without  coming  near 
him.  If  I  could  only  know  that  you  were  bearing  up  bravely,  and 
that  the  children  were  well,  and  poor  Powell  getting  better,  I  think  I 
might  even  enjoy  this  trip.  I  have  been  reading  '  Arnold  '  again  to- 
day, and  feel  much,  as  compared  with  him,  my  neglect  as  a  Christian 
parent  in  not  entering  more  into  the  feelings  and  amusements  of  my 
dear  children,  and  in  not  often  enough  talking  '  to  them  by  the  way 
of  all  these  things  that  have  come  to  pass  concerning  Jesus  of  Naz- 


JOURNEY   TO   FORT   SMITH,   ARK.  II 

areth.'  I  have  too  much  left  the  responsibility  of  their  religious 
instruction  to  you,  and  yet  I  feel  that  you  have  so  much  more  the 
knack  of  speaking  in  a  way  to  interest  them  than  I  have,  and  that 
God  has  so  blessed  your  method  of  imparting  religious  truth  to 
their  minds,  that  this  is  perhaps  some  excuse  for  me  ;  but  I  wish 
you  would  pray  that  I  may  be  enabled  better  to  fulfill  the  responsi- 
ble duties  of  a  Christian  parent,  not  only  as  regards  precept,  but 
example,  and,  oh  !  may  God  in  his  great  compassion  spare  you  long 
as  a  helpmeet  to  me  ! 

"The  boat  shakes  so  much  that  I  must  stop  till  we  have  to  take  in 
wood  again.  The  stopping  of  the  boat  last  night  was,  I  suppose, 
owing  to  fog.  How  completely  the  35th  chapter  of  Isaiah  brought 
Mr.  Julien's  voice  to  my  recollection.  It  is  a  beautiful  chapter.  I 
was  much  struck  with  it  at  the  time,  yet  don't  think  I  have  read  it 
since. 

"March  22,  1845.  We  are  only  yet  between  Fort  Adams  and 
Natchez,  and  shall  not  reach  the  latter  until  3  p.  m.,  so  that  we  are 
making  very  slow  progress.  I  read  *  Arnold  '  all  last  evening,  but  fell 
asleep  once  or  twice  over  it,  as  I  find  the  motion  of  the  boat  makes 
me  drowsy.  The  weather  continues  quite  cold,  and  there  are  fires 
lighted  in  the  stoves.  I  have  been  introduced  to  an  old  gentleman, 
a  Captain  Winter,  who  now  resides  in  Louisiana,  but  whose  father 
was  the  first  settler  in  Arkansas,  and  who  himself  went  there  as  a  boy 
with  his  father  in  1796.  He  is  now  going  to  Little  Rock  to  prose- 
cute a  claim  he  has  for  land  under  a  Spanish  grant,  and  may  go  up 
with  us  to  Fort  Gibson.  I  have  also  been  introduced  to  a  Mr.  New- 
ton, a  Virginian  and  quite  a  gentlemanly  person,  who  has  been  in 
Arkansas  since  1820.  The  gentleman  I  took  for  an  officer  is  a  mer- 
chant from  New  York,  and  has  been  traveling  about  in  this  country 
looking  after  debtors  since  November  last,  and  complains  bitterly 
of  being  obliged  to  be  so  long  absent  from  his  family.  He  seemed 
to  envy  me  having  my  family  with  me  at  New  Orleans.  He  intends 
going  up  all  the  way  to  Fort  Gibson. 

"  I  would  give  a  great  deal  to  know  how  you  and  all  my  dear  ones 
are.  I  pray  earnestly  that  you  maybe  comforted  and  supported  dur- 
ing my  absence  ;  then  the  thought  occurs  to  me  if  you,  the  desire  of 
my  eyes,  should  be  taken  from  me  before  I  return,  how  I  should 
blame  myself  for  having  gone  on  this  expedition.     May  God  in  his 


12  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

infinite  mercy  spare  you  to  me  and  our  dear  children!  Do  take  care 
of  yourself,  and  don't  overfatigue  yourself.  I  long  to  get  back  to  you 
all,  and  if  I  be  spared  to  return,  shall  duly  appreciate  good  clean 
towels  and  our  nice  room.  The  viands  on  board  here  are  neither  par- 
ticularly good  nor  even  very  abundant,  and  I  dare  say  a  little  land 
traveling  will  be  an  agreeable  variety.  The  tea  is  like  a  decoction  of 
chopped  hay,  and  no  milk  to  it,  so  I  drink  the  muddy  water,  which 
is  '  better  than  it's  bonnie.'  We  shall  not  reach  Little  Rock  until 
Thursday  next ;  I  question  if  so  soon,  unless  we  go  faster  than  we 
are  doing  at  present.  The  leaves  are  not  so  much  out  here  as  they 
are  further  south. 

"  May  the  richest  spiritual  blessings  of  the  Almighty  and  such 
temporal  ones  as  are  good  for  you  descend  on  you  and  my  dear 
children,  and  may  all  of  us  grow  in  grace  and  in  the  knowledge  of 
our  Lord  and  Saviour  Jesus  Christ  ! 

"  When  Mr.  Mylne  goes  up  the  Red  River,  send  me  a  few  lines 
by  him,  just  stating  how  you  are,  and  the  news  from  England  ;  he 
will  leave  this  for  me  at  Dr.  Seip's,  but  as  it  is  uncertain  if  I  shall 
be  able  to  go  there,  and  so  may  not  get  the  letter,  don't  put  any- 
thing private  in  it. 

"  Ever  your  own  attached  husband, 

"  Wm.  W." 

"  Arkansas  No.  4,  near  Warrenton,  20  miles  below  Vicksburg, 

Sunday,  March  23,  1845,  ^  a.  m. 
"  My  Beloved  Wife  : 

"  We  arrived  at  Natchez  yesterday  about  3.30  p.  m.,  and  there 
Ij  gave  my  letter  to  the  clerk  of  the  Corinne  steamer,  and  hope 
it  will  reach  you  safely  to-morrow.  At  Natchez  young  Mr.  Davis 
joined  us  ;  his  father  would  hardly  let  him  go  when  he  found  I  had 
another  companion  with  me,  but  I  told  him  I  would  take  good  care 
of  his  son,  and  that  he  really  ought  to  go  to  see  the  lands  and  judge 
about  them  for  himself,  so  he  got  a  berth  and  proceeds  with  us  and 
is  really  quite  a  pleasant  fellow,  with  more  sense  than  I  gave  him 
credit  for.  Of  all  things  in  the  world,  what  do  you  think  I  should 
find  on  board  an  Arkansas  boat  but  an  admirer  of  Coleridge  and 
Tennyson — one  who  knows  whole  screeds  of  both  by  heart,  and 
repeats  them,  to  the  shutting  of  my  mouth.     I  was  glad  to  see  this 


JOURNEY   TO   FORT   SMITH,   ARK.  I3 

person's  admiration  of  the  two  poets,  but  his  mode  of  repeating 
is  about  as  bad  as  Brodhead's,  and  he  does  not,  like  him,  give  him- 
self a  chance  of  hearing  the  poetry  recited  better  by  allowing  me  to 
play  first  fiddle.  This  philo-Coleridge  is  a  Dr.  I.awrie,  who  practices 
at  Little  Rock,  but  who  was  educated  in,  and  whose  family  lives  in 
Washington  City.  His  father  is  a  Scotsman.  He  himself  has  lived 
at  Little  Rock  for  several  years,  and  says  the  society  there,  though 
limited,  is  extremely  good,  and  all  the  time  he  has  been  there  he 
never  saw  a  single  fight  with  bowie  knives. 

"  It  has  occurred  to  me  since  I  left  home  that  you  should  get 
Mary  Brown*  to  give  you  the  address  in  New  York  of  those  people 
to  whom  Carr  or  Card  referred,  and  get  Maria  to  go  and  call  at 
the  place,  and  ask  them  about  his  character.  It  is  quite  possible 
that  there  may  be  no  such  people,  and  if  so,  it  will  show  that  he 
is  not  to  be  trusted  ;  if  there  be  such  people,  then  Maria  with  her  tact 
could  easily  ascertain  their  real  opinion  of  Carr  or  Card.  I  do 
think  it  is  the  silliest  thing  I  ever  heard  of  in  my  life  for  a  woman 
come  to  the  years  of  discretion  to  go  and  marry  a  man  about  whose 
previous  character  she  knows  absolutely  nothing,  and  regarding  whom 
the  accounts  she  has  heard  from  others,  whether  true  or  false,  are 
anything  but  satisfactory.  By  his  own  showing  he  has  at  least  told 
one  lie,  and  that  was  when  he  said  to  the  other  woman  he  was  a 
married  man  ;  so  if  it  prove  not  to  be  a  lie,  so  much  the  worse  for 
Mary  Brown.  However,  it  is  just  the  old  song,  'They'd  marry  the 
deil  an'  he'd  keep  them  but  bra,'  or  even  promise  to  do  it,  and 
'  Marry  in  haste  and  repent  at  leisure,'  and  '  Them  that  wuU  to 
Cupar,  maun  to  Cupar.'  Only  I  think  you  should  offer  to  write  to 
Maria  on  the  subject,  and  then  if  she  don't  write  you,  or  if  the  reply 
be  unsatisfactory  and  Mary  still  will  take  him,  her  blood  be  on  her 
own  head. 

"This  boat  gets  on  very  slowly,  and  the  living  is  far  north 
of  first  or  even  second  rate  ;  however,  it  prevents  one  overeating 
himself,  which  is  one  advantage.  The  only  incident  since  yes- 
terday is  that  I  have  lost  a  button  off  each  boot,  which  will  give 
me  something  to  do  to-morrow  in  the  way  of  sewing  them  on.  I 
would  give  a  great  deal  to  know  how  you   and  the  children  are, 

*  Mary  Brown  was  a  servant  who  accompanied  us  from  England. 


14  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

However,  you  are  in  God's  hands  ;  may  he  guide  and  protect  you  and 
me.  I  intend  if  I  can  to  send  this  from  Vicksburg.  God  bless  you, 
my  beloved  one. 

"  Ever  your  own  attached 

"  Wm.  W. 
"  P.  S. — From  all  I  hear  the  journeying  in  Arkansas  will  be  easy 
enough  and  safe  enough,  but  you  need  not  tell  this  to  anyone,  as 
one  may  as  well  have  the  credit  of  going  through  an  arduous  under- 
taking, which  most  people  who  have  not  been  there  consider  it.  I 
fancy  I  won't  have  another  opportunity  of  writing  till  I  reach  Little 
Rock.  It  may  be  two  weeks  or  more  after  you  receive  this  before 
you  hear  from  me  again. 

"  Ever  thine  own 

"Wm:  W." 


Steamer  Arkansas  No.  4,  Mississippi  River,  near  Lake  Providence, 

"Sunday  afternoon,  5  p.  m.,  March  23,  1845. 
"My  Dearest  Harriet  : 

"  I  wrote  to  you  this  morning  and  sent  off  my  letter  at  Vicksburg  ; 
that  is  to  say,  I  left  it  there  with  Punchard,  Huntington  &  Co.,  to  be 
forwarded  by  the  first  boat  to  New  Orleans.  The  captain  tells  me 
that  after  we  pass  Lake  Providence,  which  is  a  part  of  the  Missis- 
sippi so  called,  there  will  be  no  other  opportunity  of  sending  a  letter 
until  we  reach  Little  Rock  ;  that  is  to  say,  that  it  will  get  to  New 
Orleans  as  soon  from  there  as  from  any  other  place,  so  that,  although 
I  have  no  news  to  tell  you,  I  take  the  opportunity  of  the  stillness 
occasioned  by  the  boat's  stopping  to  wood  just  to  say  that  I  am 
quite  well,  and  that  we  shall  pass  Princeton  (?)  if  all  be  well 
during  the  night  ;  it  is  the  next  considerable  town  above  Vicks- 
burg, from  which  it  is  distant  about  80  miles,  and  about  120 
miles  below  the  mouth  of  the  Arkansas  River.  After  sending 
away  my  letter  this  morning  I  read  our  regular  chapters  in  Psalms 
and  Acts,  and  then  the  Epistle  of  James,  and  the  i6th  and  17th 
chapters  of  John,  and  the  35th  of  Isaiah,  but  my  mind  wandered 
a  good  deal.  After  this  I  read  '  Arnold,'  and  was  much  affected 
by  his  85th  letter,  addressed  'to  a  person  who  had  once  been 
his  landlord,  and  was  ill  of  a  painful  disorder,  but  refused  to  see  the 


JOURNEY   TO   FORT   SMITH,   ARK.  1 5 

clergyman  of  the  parish  or  allow  his  friends  to  address  him  on  reli- 
gious subjects.'  This  letter  is  a  gem,  so  full  of  the  love  of  Christ, 
humbleness  of  mind,  and  godly  sincerity.  I  think  you  must  send 
to  Norman's  in  Camp  Street  and  buy  another  copy  of  'Arnold's  Life,' 
as  my  present  intention  is  to  make  that  a  present  to  Mr.  Pelton,  in 
the  hopes  that  it  may  be  the  means  of  doing  himself  good,  and  of 
giving  him  just  and  right  views  on  the  subject  of  education. 

"  It  has  been  raining  heavily  all  day,  and  keeps  pretty  cold.  The 
river  is  brimful  and  running  over  its  banks  in  many  places.  The 
scenery  is  woefully  monotonous  and  uninteresting,  and  I  believe 
the  Arkansas  River  scenery  is  very  much  of  the  same  description 
until  you  get  to  Little  Rock,  when  the  land  becomes  elevated.  We 
have  stoves  with  fires  on  in  the  cabin,  and,  although  it  is  rather  hot 
with  them,  it  is  too  cold  when  the  fire  is  out.  I  shall  be  pretty  well 
tired  of  steamboating  by  the  time  I  reach  Little  Rock.  I  am  thank- 
ful I  have  '  Arnold,'  and  Pelton  has  also  some  magazines.  I  am  glad 
to  see  there  is  enough  observance  of  the  Sunday  on  board  to 
prevent  anyone  playing  at  cards  to-day,  although  there  are  so  many 
French  Creole  passengers.  I  read  over  all  your  three  epistles  to 
me  with  much  edification.  You  preach  to  my  heart  better  than 
anyone.  I  feel  that,  in  spite  of  all  my  hardness  of  heart  and  worldly- 
mindedness,  I  love  our  blessed  Saviour  more  than  I  once  did,  and 
that,  however  far  my  practice  falls  short,  I  have  from  time  to  time  a 
strong  wish  to  bring  every  thought  in  subjection  to  Christ.  I  am 
sure  if  I  could  serve  him  more  and  the  world  less,  my  present 
happiness  would  be  much  greater.  Oh  !  may  the  Spirit  dwell  with 
us  and  our  dear  children,  and  work  in  us  and  them,  not  only  to  will 
but  also  to  do  of  his  good  pleasure  !  This  will  probably  reach  you 
about  Wednesday  or  Thursday,  by  which  time  I  hope  to  be  at  Little 
Rock.  I  believe  this  boat  will  go  no  higher  than  Fort  Smith,  which 
is  on  the  borders  of  Arkansas  and  the  Indian  Territory.  Fort 
Gibson  is  thirty  miles  further,  but  the  captain  does  not  think  there 
will  be  water  enough  to  go  there.  I  hope  the  rain  will  be  over  before 
our  land  journey  begins  ;  if  not,  the  roads  will  be  impassable,  and  we 
will  just  have  to  return  in  this  boat ;  however,  it  may  be  dry  enough 
ten  days  hence,  and  we  will  not  be  ready  for  the  land  traveling 
until  after  that. 

"  Even  if  you  be  well,  you  will  not  be  able  to  go  to  church  to-day 


l6  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

if  it  be  raining  with  you  as  it  is  here.  God  bless  and  watch  over 
you,  my  precious  one,  and  may  he  bless  and  instruct  my  dear  chil- 
dren in  the  things  of  everlasting  life  ;  may  they  and  we  grow 
in  grace  and  in  the  knowledge  of  our  Lord  and  Saviour  Jesus 
Christ  !  I  direct  this  letter  as  if  to  myself  to  prevent  its  being 
opened. 

"  Ever  your  own  attached 

"Wm.  W." 

"Bachelor's  Bend,  Mississippi, 

"Monday,  March  24,  1845. 
"  Mv  Dearest  Harriet  : 

"  We  are  just  stopping  to  wood,  and  I  see  a  sign  with  '  Post  Office  ' 
stuck  up  on  the  bank  of  the  river,  so  I  give  this  a  chance'  to  reach 
you,  to  let  you  know  that  I  am  so  much  farther  on  my  journey,  and 
that  we  expect  to  reach  the  mouth  of  the  Arkansas  River  this  even- 
ing. The  weather  still  continues  bleak  and  cold,  but  it  is  not  rain- 
ing at  present.  We  have  the  Lady  Superior  or  abbess  of  all  the 
convents  in  the  south  of  the  United  States  on  board.  She  joined 
us  at  Vicksburgand  is  dressed  in  a  nun's  costume.  She  is  a  decent, 
quiet-looking  woman  of  about  forty-five,  and  looks  like  a  '  widow 
indeed.'  As  the  breakfast  is  still  on  the  table,  lam  standing  writing 
this  on  my  bed  in  my  stateroom,  as  I  wrote  to  you  last  evening,  and 
have  only  been  sleeping  and  reading'  Arnold  '  since.  I  have  nothing 
new  to  say.  I  now  go  to  read  my  Bible.  Kiss  Helen  and  Willie 
and  Harriet  and  Bessie  and  Charlotte  and  Johnnie  for  me.  I  love 
and  bless  them  all,  and  their  dear  mother  above  and  beyond  them  all. 

"  God  bless  you  and  the  dear  children  ! 

"  Ever  your  own  attached 

"Wm.  W." 

"New  Orleans,  March  24,   1845. 
"  My  Own  Precious  Husband  : 

"  I  have  just  by  mere  chance  found  a  note  in  Charlotte's  room 
telling  me  of  this  opportunity  to  write  to  you,  and  since  the  letter  is 
to  be  in  the  boat  before  twelve  noon,  I  have  not  many  minutes  to 
lose.  I  am  almost  sorry  to  have  this  chance  of  writing  you  till  I  have 
better  news  to  tell,  but  you  may  rely  upon  me  that  I  am  not  con- 


JOURNEY   TO   FORT   SMITH,   ARK.  ly 

sealing  anything  from  you,  but  telling  you  everything  good  or  bad. 
After  you  left  I  could  not  rally  myself  at  all,  but  sat  in  a  sort  of 
stupor  without  being  able  to  weep,  but  felt  a  choked  and  burning 
sensation  at  my  throat  and  head  ;  this  lasted  some  time,  to  the  grief 
and  consternation  of  my  beloved  children,  as  my  voice  almost 
entirely  forsook  me,  and  was  husky  and  low.  A  dose  of  camphor 
and  my  temples  and  hands  rubbed  with  it  did  me  some  good,  and 
before  I  went  to  bed  I  wept  plentifully  and  felt  relieved.  Charlotte 
soothed  me  and  remonstrated  with  me  like  an  old  experienced 
Christian,  quoting  promise  after  promise  from  the  Bible  to  comfort 
me,  and,  though  I  could  not  speak,  I  felt  grateful  to  God  who  had 
taught  her  by  the  Holy  Spirit  to  feel  and  understand  these  precious 
truths.  It  was  not  that  I  gave  way  to  my  feelings,  but  that  /  did  not 
give  way,  that  caused  this  attack.  I  am  sure  my  feelings  were  too 
strong  to  be  pent  up,  for  never,  never  did  I  feel  as  I  have  felt  this  time 
in  parting  with  you.  Your  precious  letter  has  been  read  as  a  text- 
book daily,  and  iox  your  sake  I  have  kept  in  better  spirits,  trying  not 
to  think  of  evils  which  may  never  come.  When  dear  John  Walter 
came  home  at  night,  he  put  by  his  books  at  once  and  began  to  rub 
my  head,  which  he  did  very  nicely  ;  then  he  sat  down  and  of  his  own 
accord  read  me  two  or  three  of  the  most  comforting  chapters  in  the 
Bible,  while  his  voice  trembled  with  emotion,  and  the  tears  coursed 
each  other  down  his  cheeks.  On  Friday  I  was  better,  and  Helen 
Nicholson  wrote  me  a  note  asking  me  to  go  and  hear  Dr.  Hawks 
with  her.  I  thought  it  would  do  me  good,  and  went  and  heard  a 
most  excellent  sermon.  On  coming  home  I  found  Harriet  and 
Powell  not  so  well,  which  continuing  I  sent  for  Dr.  Rushton  on 
Saturday  ;  he  came  and,  seeing  Harriet,  said  there  is  an  irregular 
action  of  the  liver,  and  has  commenced  giving  her  '  hydra  creta,'  or 
whatever  it  is,  but  as  yet  it  has  done  her  no  good,  for  she  has  not 
been  nearly  so  well — very  sick  with  a  headache  and  pain  in  her 
stomach.  Powell's  blister  has  done  her  no  good  ;  it  drew  well,  but 
she  is  more  feverish,  and  the  palpitation  is  no  better  ;  the  rheumatism, 
however,  seems  removed.  To-day  she  is  to  be  taken  to  the  children's 
room  downstairs,  so  that  7<?«r  being  away  has  done  some  good,  as  it 
keeps  the  nursery  more  aired  for  Harriet,  and  gives  her  Powell's  bed 
by  herself,  also  gives  Powell  a  quiet  room  by  herself.  I  sleep  quite 
comfortably  with  Charlotte  and  little  quiet  Bessie,  having  plenty   of 


l8  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

room  and  they  are  company  for  me.  Willie  and  Helen  are  quite 
well  again,  and  I  hear  nothing  more  about  the  whooping  cough,  so  I 
hope  it  was  a  false  report.  I  did  not  write  to  either  Anna  or  Mary 
on  Thursday  night,  being  too  ill,  but  on  Friday  night  I  wrote  to 
Anna  Winthrop.  Sunday  was  a  wet  day,  but  Charlotte,  J.  W.,  and 
I  went  to  church,  as  it  was  only  shoAvery,  and  we  got  there  and 
back  again  without  rain.  I  had  a  pretty  bad  attack  yesterday,  but 
to-day  am  better  and  my  spiritual  comforts  abound.  I  know  that 
God  is  with  me,  that  he  is  my  Father  in  Christ  Jesus,  and  no  good 
thing  will  be  withheld  from  me. 

"  Dr.  Rushton  says  that  he  does  not  apprehend  any  immediate 
danger  from  Powell's  complaint,  but  that  she  will  likely  never  get 
rid  of  it,  and  that  it  might  prove  fatal  very  suddenly,  as  all  com- 
plaints of  the  heart  are  dangerous.  But  I  dare  not  wait  to  write 
more,  lest  this  should  be  too  late.  Oh  !  my  soul's  dearest,  pray  for 
me,  and  do  not  add  to  my  burdens  hy  yourself  giving  way  to  despond- 
ency, or  exposing  your  precious  self  to  needless  risk.  My  prayers 
are  for  you  morning,  noon,  and  night,. and  in  the  watches  of  the 
night. 

''Your  own  "  H." 

"  Anthony  House  Hotel,  Little  Rock,  Ark., 

"Friday,  March  28,  1845. 
"  My  Beloved  Wife  : 

"  I  wrote  you  last  a  few  lines  from  Bachelor's  Bend  on  the  Mis- 
sissippi, dated  Monday,  24th  inst.,  and  I  only  arrived  here  at  noon 
to-day.  The  water  in  the  Arkansas  River  was  very  low,  and  the 
Arkansas  No,  4  stuck  for  thirty  mortal  hours  on  a  sand  bar,  hard 
aground  from  Wednesday,  26th  inst.,  about  2  a.  m.,  till  Thursday, 
27th  inst.,  about  breakfast  time,  and  then,  although  we  got  off,  we 
had  no  certainty  of  being  able  to  reach  Little  Rock.  So  Pelton, 
Davis,  and  a  Mr.  Smith  of  New  York,  and  I  got  on  board  a  little 
steamer  called  the  Lucy  Long  about  10  a.  m.  yesterday  and  got  here 
safely  by  her.  She  was  very  small,  but  comfortable  and  quiet,  and 
we  had  cleaner  and  better  living  on  board  her  than  we  had  in  the 
large  boat,  which  won't  be  here  for  several  hours  yet,  if  she  reach 
this  at  all.  The  sail  up  the  Arkansas  River  is  pretty  monotonous, 
therefore,   though  rather  more    interesting  than  the  banks  of  the 


JOURNEY   TO   FORT   SMITH,   ARK.  19 

Mississippi,  which  constitute  the  most  misbegotten,  half-made  land 
I  ever  saw  up  above  Vicksburg.  Here  the  scenery  of  the  Arkansas 
changes,  becomes  rocky  and  hilly,  but  the  water  is  so  low  that  there 
is  very  little  chance  of  even  a  small  steamer  going  up  to  Fort  Smith, 
and  so  our  only  chance  is  riding  or  going  in  a  stagecoach  which 
leaves  this  on  Tuesday  next,  April  i,  and  this  latter  mode  of  travel 
we  at  present  intend  adopting  if  the  river  do  not  rise  sufficiently 
between  now  and  then.  I  finished  '  Arnold  '  before  I  left  the  Arkan- 
sas No.  4,  and  was  much  affected  by  the  description  of  his  sudden 
death,  and  the  thought  of  how  much  good  he  had  done  before  he 
was  called  away,  and  how  little  I  had  done,  although  only  about  nine 
years  his  junior. 

"  The  time  in  the  steamer  has  passed  not  unpleasantly  ;  that  is, 
there  is  nothing  particularly  unpleasant  except  the  swearing,  and 
nothing  particularly  agreeable  except  the  fine  weather.  I  found  one 
or  two  on  board  who  seemed  to  be  actuated  by  religious  principles, 
and  my  intercourse  with  all  the  passengers  was  quite  pleasant, 
although  I  found  two  of  them  had  possession  of  portions  of  our  land 
under  what  are  called  tax  titles,  thus  adding  to  the  bother  and 
trouble  about  these  Arkansas  lands,  which  I  would  be  well  pleased 
to  be  rid  of  for  the  original  cost,  without  interest.  However,  there 
is  no  use  in  crying  after  spilled  milk,  and  all  these  difficulties  which 
surround  us  are  for  our  good,  no  doubt.  If  our  titles  were  clear  to 
all  the  lands,  I  am  not  sure  but  that  I  would  be  disposed  to  consider 
them  of  more  value  than  when  I  started,  thinking  them  then  as 
worth  little  or  nothing. 

"  At  this  house  there  is  no  getting  a  single  room,  so  Pelton  and  I 
are  quartered  together,  and  Davis  and  Smith.  These  three  are  out 
at  present  surveying  the  town,  which  is  really  rather  pretty  and  of 
some  size  and  consideration  for  Arkansas,  with  a  good  number  of 
brick  houses  and  several  very  pretty  gardens.  The  people  who  dine 
at  the  table  at  the  inn  are  a  pretty  rough-looking  set,  but  quiet 
enough.  If  I  could  only  know  that  you  and  my  darling  children 
are  well,  and  the  two  servants  going  on  comfortably,  I  would  enjoy 
seeing  the  new  country,  even  although  not  very  interesting.  I  try  to 
enjoy  myself  and  to  put  my  trust  in  God  concerning  you  all,  and 
upon  the  whole  have  certainly  enjoyed  myself  more  than  I  expected. 
Both  Pelton  and  Davis  are  pleasant  companions,  and  so  is   Smith, 


20  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

and  perhaps  the  millstone  of  care  about  you  and  the  business  just 
serves  to  keep  me  sufficiently  sober  and  sedate  for  the  father  of  six 
children.  Oh,  God  bless  you,  dear  one  !  how  very  dear  you  are  to 
me  ;  and  my  precious  children  !  how  I  love  them  all  and  appreciate 
all  their  little  differences  of  character  !  I  am  sure  never  man  was 
so  blessed  in  wife  and  children  as  I  am,  and  if  our  inheritance  here 
promises  to  be  but  small,  let  us  thank  God  that  he  has  given  us  and 
our  dear  little  ones  an  earnest  of  better  inheritance  hereafter. 

"I  caught  a  bad  cold  in  the  head  in  the  steamer,  but  it  has  now 
gone,  thanks  partly  to  a  tumbler  of  hot  lemonade,  administered  the 
night  before  last  by  Mr.  Pelton  after  I  went  to  bed.  Your  dear 
letter  has,  as  usual,  afforded  me  daily  comfort  and  interest.  Dear 
Harriet,  those  sad,  sad  looks  of  yours  at  our  parting  dwell  on  my 
heart,  and  if  it  please  God  to  spare  us  to  meet,  I  never  will,  with  my 
own  consent,  be  separated  from  you  again  for  so  long  a  time. 

"Our  agent  here  is  a  little  old  respectable-looking  'manny,'with 
dark  eyes,  but  little  energy.  I  should  say  careful  and  correct  enough 
with  what  he  does,  but  not  bothering  himself  to  ascertain  if  what  he 
is  doing  be  all  on  a  proper  and  correct  basis.  However,  what  is  the 
use  of  bothering  you  with  these  business  matters  ?  I  think  even  if 
the  steamer  go  to  Fort  Smith  we  will  hardly  leave  this  before  Mon- 
day, 31st  inst.;  and  if  we  do  not,  then  not  before  Tuesday,  April 
I,  so  I  hope  to  write  to  you  again  before  I  go  further.  The  post 
leaves  this  before  daybreak  to-morrow,  and  this  letter  must  be  in 
before  dark,  and  I  have  yet  to  write  to  A.  &  J.  D.  &  Co. 

"  I  can  form  no  idea  of  the  time  when  I  shall  reach  New  Orleans, 
as  the  delays  in  getting  along  are  so  many,  and  the  uncertainty  as  to 
conveyances  so  great.  However,  you  may  depend  upon  it  that  I 
will  return  as  speedily  as  I  can.  May  God  Almighty  watch  over  you 
and  my  dear  children  and  myself,  and  unite  us  again  in  health  and 
strength  and  happiness.  Oh  !  may  the  Holy  Spirit  dwell  with  us  all, 
and  work  in  us  both  to  will  and  to  do  of  his  good  pleasure  for  our 
blessed  Saviour's  sake  !  I  shall  not  hear  from  you  till  my  return 
here  from  Fort  Smith. 

"  Your  own  attached  "  Wm.  W." 

In  sailing,  or  rather  steaming,  up  the  Arkansas  River  on  the  way 
to  Little  Rock  from  the   Mississippi  we  repeatedly  stuck  on  sand 


JOURNEY   TO   FORT   SMITH,   ARK.  21 

bars,  and  I  witnessed  a  very  curious  mode  of  getting  the  steamer  off 
the  bar  and  into  the  deep  water  on  the  upper  side.  Long  and 
strong  poles,  one  on  each  side  of  the  bow  of  the  boat,  were  set 
upright  in  the  water,  with  a  block  and  tackle  at  the  top  of  each. 
The  engine  was  then  started  to  wind  up  the  fore  part  of  the 
boat  out  of  the  water,  and  when  it  was  sufficiently  raised,  the  whole 
force  of  the  steam  was  set  to  work  the  paddles,  and  the  boat  was 
literally ///w/^^  over  the  bar  into  the  deeper  water  beyond. 

It  was  on  the  Arkansas  that  I  finished  Stanley's  "  Life  of  Dr. 
Arnold  of  Rugby,"  which  brought  the  tears  into  my  eyes.  In  1846, 
when  I  went  to  Oxford  with  Tom  Sellar  to  see  his  brother  William, 
on  his  promotion  to  a  fellowship  of  Oriel  from  Balliol  College, 
Arthur  Penrhyn  Stanley  was  pointed  out  to  me  on  the  street,  in  his 
cap  and  gown.  Long  years  afterward,  in  1878,  I  think,  when  I  was 
president  of  the  Board  of  Education,  I  welcomed  him  to  the  Normal 
College,  and  told  where  I  had  finished  his  "  Life  of  Arnold " 
and  the  effect  it  had  upon  me.  Dean  Stanley  was  to  sail  for  Eng- 
land on  the  afternoon  of  the  day  he  visited  the  Normal  College  with 
Mayor  Wickham  and  myself,  and  apropos  of  that  event  1  opened  the 
college  by  reading  the  20th  chapter  of  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  end- 
ing with  these  words  :  "  Sorrowing  most  of  all  for  the  words  that 
he  spake,  that  they  should  see  his  face  no  more.  And  they  accom- 
panied him  unto  the  ship."  Dean  Stanley  was  so  much  pleased 
with  my  selection  of  the  chapter  that,  after  he  reached  England,  he 
wrote  to  Dr.  Field,  requesting  him  to  give  me  his  thanks  for  his 
reception  at  the  Normal  College,  and  for  my  selection  of  the  chapter 
I  had  read. 

"  Little  Rock,  March  29,  1845. 
"  My  Beloved  Harriet  : 

"  I  wrote  to  you  from  this  place  yesterday  announcing  my  safe 
arrival.  The  Arkansas  No.  4  arrived  about  eight  in  the  evening, 
eight  hours  after  we  did,  and  after  having  put  half  her  cargo  on 
board  our  little  Lucy  Long.  I  had  a  good  wash  last  evening,  and  a 
very  decent  sleep  last  night.  This  is  a  hot,  summerlike  day,  and 
very  delightful  at  present  (8.30  a.  m.),  but  it  will  be  woefully  hot,  I 
fear,  by  noon.  We  have  some,  but  slight,  hopes  that,  from  the  num- 
ber of  passengers  offering,  the  captain  of  the  Lucy  Long  may  be 


22  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

induced  to  go  up  to  Fort  Smith,  which  would  be  very  desirable,  as  it 
would  save  a  long,  wearisome  stage  drive. 

"  Last  evening  we  visited  the  penitentiary  here,  in  which  are 
about  thirty-eight  prisoners,  one  of  whom  is  the  late  mayor  of  this 
redoubtable  city  of  Little  Rock,  who  is  confined  for  forgery.  To-day 
I  have  been  very  busy  getting  information  about  our  lands,  etc., 
writing  to  our  agent  here  and  to  our  New  Orleans  house  [A.  &  J. 
D.  &  Co.],  so  that  I  have  missed  taking  a  fine  walk  in  the  environs 
with  my  three  comrades  ;  however,  they  propose  taking  another 
stroll  this  afternoon,  and  as  I  have  now  got  my  business  for  the  day 
about  done,  I  intend  to  accompany  them. 

"  I  have  not  yet  written  to  Mr.  De  Peyster,  because,  in  the  first 
place,  I  have  had  no  time,  and,  in  the  second,  I  wish  to  date  my 
letter  from  the  remotest  point  of  my  journey.  I  find  the  people  all 
very  civil,  and  I  have  been  promoted  to  the  highest  seat  at  table  to- 
day. The  staple  dishes  are  wild  turkeys  and  venison,  the  former 
immense  birds  and  remarkably  good  ;  they  sell  by  retail  at  fifty  cents 
each,  and  are  in  great  abundance.  The  keeper  of  the  hotel  told  us 
last  night  that,  for  some  time  past,  as  many  as  twenty  per  day  have 
been  offered  to  him  for  sale.  The  Lucy  Long  is  advertised  to  go  to 
Fort  Smith  to-morrow  (Sunday),  but  it  is  doubtful  if  she  will  go 
before  Monday,  and  equally  doubtful  if  she  will  go  at  all.  I  will 
not  finish  this  till  evening  or  to-morrow  morning.  Meanwhile  may 
God  Almighty  bless  you  and  my  dear  children. 

"  Sunday,  March  30.  I  lay  about  an  hour  awake  this  morning 
before  I  got  up,  thinking  of  and  praying  for  my  precious  wife  and 
dear  children,  and  repeating  hymns  to  myself,  and  felt  '  that  peace 
which  passeth  all  understanding.'  It  is  curious  that  my  poor  little 
wayward  Harriet  has  been  very  fresh  in  my  remembrance  to-day  ; 
may  God  bless  her  and  make  her  one  of  his  own  dear  children,  and 
as  she  grows  in  years  may  she  grow  in  grace  and  in  the  knowledge 
of  her  Lord  and  Saviour  Jesus  Christ.  And  my  dear  little  quiet 
Bessie  has  been  present  to  my  mind,  and  sweet  Charlotte,  and  I  have 
been  talking  of  my  great,  big,  manly  John  Walter,  and  I  don't  forget 
my  darling  Willie  and  his  large  nostrils,  nor  little  dainty  Miss 
Helen,  who  certainly  is  the  smallest  piece  of  humanity,  for  nineteen 
months,  I  ever  saw. 

"  I  had  a  pleasant  talk  with  Davis  to-day,  telling  him  of  my  first 


JOURNEY   TO   FORT   SMITH,   ARK.  23 

meeting  with  you,  etc.,  etc.,  in  all  of  which  he  appeared  to  be  inter- 
ested, and  I  know  /  was  ;  this  was  on  board  the  Arkansas  No.  4, 
where  we  went  and  sat  in  the  ladies'  cabin  for  an  hour  before 
church,  as  being  the  pleasantest  place  we  could  go  to,  and  the 
quietest.  She  goes  to  New  Orleans  this  evening,  but  I  send  this  by 
mail,  as,  owing  to  the  low  state  of  the  river,  this  will  reach  New 
Orleans  before  she  does,  although  it  does  not  leave  this  till  Tuesday. 

"  We  all  four  went  to  the  Episcopal  church.  I  went  there  partly 
out  of  respect  to  Dr.  Arnold  and  partly  because  the  other  three 
were  Episcopalians.  We  had  a  fair  enough  sermon,  and  the  singing 
was  good,  and  I  saw  three  young  ladies,  one  young  man,  and  a  fine 
chubby  infant  baptized.  I  have  some  intention  of  going  to  the 
Methodist  church  this  evening  if  the  weather  keep  good,  but  it 
threatens  rain,  which,  if  it  comes,  will  do  us  good  by  raising  the 
river.  The  Lucy  Long  will  not  go  before  this  evening,  and  more 
probably  not  until  to-morrow  morning,  but  she  is  now  apparently 
certain  to  go,  which  is  satisfactory.  Last  afternoon  I  took  a  stroll 
and  saw  the  arsenal,  and  Mr.  Albert  Pike,  the  poet's,  house,  a  good, 
substantial,  two-story,  double  brick  house  surrounded  by  a  pretty 
garden.  He  came  here  a  poor  boy,  literally  without  a  cent,  and  is 
now  the  first  lawyer  in  the  State,  and  a  remarkably  fine-looking, 
handsome  man  besides.  I  had  a  letter  to  him,  but  he  is  not  here. 
I  met  him,  however,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Arkansas  River.  By  the 
way,  do  you  know  that  at  this  present  writing  I  am  actually  946 
miles  from  New  Orleans  ? 

"Davis*  mother  is  a  Spaniard — that  is  to  say,  her  father  was.  He 
was  Governor  Vidal  of  Louisiana  when  that  province  belonged  to 
the  Spaniards,  and  Davis  has  several  relatives  among  the  grandees  of 
Spain.  I  find  him  an  amiable,  gentlemanly  young  man,  very  well 
disposed,  but  deficient  in  energy. 

"  I  find  that  human  nature  in  Arkansas,  stripped  of  the  husk  of 
custom,  is  ludicrously  like  human  nature  anywhere  else,  and  neither 
better  nor  worse.  The  landlord  here  gave  a  splendid  supper  last 
night,  with  lots  of  champagne  and  fresh  oysters  from  New  Orleans 
brought  up  in  tin  cans  hermetically  fastened  and  then  packed  in  ice. 
The  other  three  went  to  it,  but  I  went  to  bed  about  nine  o'clock, 
and  knew  nothing  of  it  till  this  morning.  Pelton  tells  me  that  the 
supper  was  beautifully  laid  out,  and  went  off  very  quietly.     I  wish  I 


24  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

had  seen  it,  so  as  to  testify  against  Featherstonhaugh's  lies  about 
Arkansas. 

"5  p.  M.  After  dinner  we  took  a  walk  to  a  very  pretty  garden 
kept  by  some  German  on  the  outskirts  of  Little  Rock,  and  I  am  now 
going  to  put  this  in  the  post  office,  as  it  is  possible  the  Lucy  Long 
may  start  this  evening  for  Fort  Smith  when  the  moon  rises.  If  not,, 
then  she  will  go  to-morrow  morning  ;  so  if  you  don't  hear  from  me 
to-morrow,  you  may  conclude  that  I  have  gone,  and  will  not  be  back 
here  under  a  week  or  ten  days,  and  it  will  be  at  least  that  time  before 
you  hear  from  me  again. 

"I  saw  to-day  at  a  Dr.  Sprague's  a  great  many  curious  minerals 
found  in  Arkansas,  and  also  a  petrified  horse's  hoof,  and  various 
curious  vases,  the  manufacture  of  the  ancient  Indians.  I  have  also 
seen  two  drunken  Choctaw  Indians  on  the  street  to-day. 

"  May  God  forever  watch  over  you  and  my  dear  children. 

"Ever  your  own  attached  "Wm.  W." 

"Little  Rock,  Monday,  March  31,  1845. 
"  My  Dearest  H.  : 

"This  is  a  wet,  muggy  morning,  and  I  am  just  going  to  start  for 
Fort  Smith,  and  now  stand  by  my  bedside  writing  these  few  lines 
before  the  porter  comes  for  my  baggage.  The  wet,  although  dis- 
agreeable, will  raise  the  river  and  give  us  a  better  passage,  and  if  any 
boat  can  go  up,  the  Lucy  Long  will,  as  she  draws  so  little  water. 

"  We  went  to  the  Methodist  church  last  night,  and  heard  really  a 
good  simple  sermon  on  the  text  :  '  I  must  work  while  it  is  day,'  etc., 
but  its  effect  was  much  spoiled  by  the  dreadfully  loud,  quick  voice  of 
the  preacher.  The  first  hymn  was  '  The  Star  of  Bethlehem,'  sung 
to  a  nice'tune,  but  roared  out  most  terribly  loud  by  the  clerk,  but  it 
put  me  in  mind  of  poor  Charlotte  and  home,  and  I  sung  it  from  the 
heart.  I  wrote  to  you  yesterday  under  cover  to  A.  &  J.  Dennis- 
toun  &  Co.,  but  as  I  direct  this  to  the  St.  Louis,  you  may  get  it  first. 
God  forever  bless  and  watch  over  you,  my  precious  wife,  and  may 
he  also  bless  my  dear  children,  and  unite  all  of  us  in  health  and 
happiness  once  again.     In  haste, 

"  Ever  thine  own  "  Wm.  W." 

In  a  notebook  which  I  kept  during  my  Arkansas  trip  I  find  the 
following  under  date  of  April  2,  1845  : 


JOURNEY   TO   FORT   SMITH,   ARK.  2$ 

"  Passed  at  6.30  last  evening  a  rock  or  hill,  rising  abruptly  from 
the  side  of  the  river,  covered  to  the  top  with  trees,  and  called  the 
Dardanelles  ;  it  is  in  shape  something  like  Dumbarton  Rock,  but 
only  about  half  the  height.  The  Magazine  Mountain,  lying  behind 
it,  looks  not  unlike  the  range  of  Dumbarton  hills  which  terminate 
in  the  hill  above  Dumbarton  Castle  ;  I  forget  its  name. 

"We  have  struck  a  snag  and  broken  twenty  timbers,  and  are  now 
aground  on  the  trunk  of  a  tree,  and  it  looks  quite  hopelessly  so.  It 
is  now  nearly  4  p.  m.  and  we  have  been  aground  since  7  a.  m. 
There  is  now  some  prospect  of  getting  off,  but  we  have  had  a  weary 
day  of  it  ;    to  pass  the  time  I  wrote  the  following  : 

I     "  While  aground  upon  a  snag  in  the  far  Arkansas  River, 

Where  the  cottonwood  grows  on  the  bank,  and  the  redbud  blossoms  quiver, 

I  think  of  wife  and  children  a  thousand  miles  away. 

And  for  every  blessing  on  them  full  fervently  I  pray. 

Oh  !  may  my  blessed  Harriet  be  spared  in  strength  and  health. 

May  my  children  grow  in  wisdom,  which  is  better  far  than  wealth. 

When  this  long  journey's  ended,  may  our  partings  be  no  more, 

And  may  God  be  pleased  to  bless  us  in  our  basket  and  our  store. 

"Got  under  way  about  4  p.  M. ;  stopped  to  wood  at  Piney  Creek, 
just  on  the  borders  of  Pope  and  Johnson  counties  ;  land  high  on  both 
sides  of  the  river  and  covered  with  pines,  indicative  of  poor  soil." 

"  New  Orleans,  April  2,  1845. 
"  My  Own  Loved  Will  : 

"  Where  are  you  now  ?  Is  your  spirit  sympathizing  and  sor- 
rowing with  mine  ?  My  last  letter  (your  fourth)  was  received  on 
Monday  (this  is  Wednesday),  dated  Bachelor's  Bend,  Monday, 
March  24.  These  have  been  the  weariest  and  longest  two  weeks  I 
ever  spent  in  my  life.  I  have  not  only  counted  the  days  but  the 
Aours  since  you  left,  and  sometimes  I  feel  as  if  I  must  write  urging 
you  to  come  home,  and  no  matter  for  the  business.  Poor  Powell  has 
been  gradually  getting  worse  since  you  left.  In  my  last  letter  I  said 
she  had  been  worse,  but  was  better.  I  did  not  say  /low  much  worse, 
but  she  was  very  near  death,  and  my  feelings  have  been  harrowed 
up  and  excited  to  the  utmost.  She  is  now  again  better,  but  still 
dangerously  ill ;  last  night  she  thought  herself  would  be  her  last. 
The  daylight  revives  her,  and  this  evening  she  is  calmer,  and  I  hope 


26  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

may  have  a  better  night.  On  Sunday  she  was  bled  in  the  arm  till 
she  was  almost  gone  ;  this  relieved  her  for  a  few  hours.  Last  night 
she  had  mustard  blisters  over  both  ankles  to  the  calves  of  the  legs, 
after  bathing  the  feet  with  mustard  and  hot  water  ;  this,  I  think, 
excited  her  and  made  her  worse, — and  I  told  the  doctor  so, — which 
excited  me  and  made  me  worse,  for  I  think  his  treatment  of  her  has 
been  by  far  too  severe  ;  and  not  only  this,  but  I  think  he  has  been 
the  cause  (under  God)  of  all  this  illness  by  experimenting  upon  her, 
for  she  was  recovering  from  the  rheumatism,  and  her  heart  was  no 
worse  than  it  had  been  for  years,  when  he  asked  her  if  she  had  not 
an  affection  of  the  heart  and  recommended  blistering  ;  the  excite- 
ment of  the  blister  caused  such  violent  palpitation  that  other 
remedies  were  necessary,  and  so  she  has  gone  from  bad  to  worse.  I 
have  already  paid  over  five  dollars  for  medicines,  and  he  wants  to 
have  her  leeched  and  cupped  ;  the  expense  of  these  is  enormous, 
and  his  visits,  I  am  told,  are  too  exorbitantly  charged  for  anything. 
Helen  Nicholson  says  he  charged  them  for  a  servant  who  was  ill  two 
months  three  hundred  dollars,  and  one  of  the  head  waiters  here  told 
Mary  that  he  was  valet  to  a  gentleman  who  was  ill  three  weeks,  and 
Rushton  attended  him  ;  his  bill  was  five  hundred  dollars.  I  am 
anxious  for  your  advice  what  to  do.  Now,  such  a  charge  as  this  the 
concern  ivill  fiot  pay,  and  we  cannot  without  much  inconvenience. 
Mylne  has  just  been  here,  and  says  all  this  is  quite  true  of  Rushton, 
and  that  for  three  weeks'  visits  to  him  he  charged  five  hundred  dollars. 
Poor  Powell  to-day  told  me  she  could  never  be  sufficiently  grateful 
to  us,  for  had  she  been  with  an  irreligious  family  she  might  have 
been  turned  out  to  die  alone.  Now  she  is  in  a  peculiar  sense  our 
brother.  '  A  certain  man  went  down  from  Jerusalem  to  Jericho,'  or 
from  Liverpool  to  New  Orleans,  and  fell  among  thieves.  The 
Samaritan  took  him  to  an  inn,  set  him  on  his  own  beast,  and  poured 
in  oil  and  wine,  or  medicine,  paid  for  him  at  the  inn,  and  was  com- 
mended by  our  Lord.  We  are  to  love  our  neighbor  as  ourselves. 
The  Lord  loveth  a  cheerful  giver  ;  the  stranger  we  are  to  take  in, 
and  the  sick  we  are  to  visit ;  the  thirsty  to  give  drink,  the  hungry  to 
give  meat ;  and  all  these  sayings  of  our  Lord  we  hear,  and  he  that 
heareth  these  sayings  and  doeth  them  not,  shall  be  like  unto  the  man 
that  built  his  house  upon  the  sand. 

"  Mary  behaved  very  ill  in  trying  to  put  all  the  work  upon  me,  and 


JOURNEY   TO   FORT   SMITH,   ARK.  2/ 

looking  very  sulky  and  ill-tempered  if  she  were  asked  to  assist  in  any 
way.  This  continued  not  only  to  my  great  increase  of  fatigue,  but  it 
depressed  my  spirits,  until  Sunday  night  she  went  to  church  and  I 
had  to  run  from  Powell  to  the  baby  all  the  time  till  I  was  half  dead. 
About  ten  she  came  home,  and,  finding  me  sitting  by  the  baby,  said 
she  was  very  ill  and  had  fainted  in  church.  I  took  no  notice  then,  for 
I  thought  she  couldn't  be  very  ill  if  she  could  walk  the  streets  till  ten 
o'clock  ;  she  had  previously  been  refusing  to  go  up  and  down  stairs 
with  the  children,  saying  :  '  My  back  aches  and  I  shall  be  ill  next.' 
This  annoyed  me,  for  I  thought  she  only  did  it  to  get  rid  of  the  extra 
work.  Well,  on  Monday  at  worship  she  deliberately  rises  up,  walks 
into  the  room  where  Powell  was  lying,  and,  sitting  herself  down  by 
the  bedside,  begins  to  bellow  aloud  with  a  regular  hysteric  fit.  I 
arose,  and  with  as  much  composure  as  I  could  command  ordered 
her  out  of  the  room.  I  soon  followed  and  told  her  pretty  plainly 
what  I  thought  of  her  conduct.  This,  as  usual  with  Mary  Brown, 
produced  a  good  effect,  and  she  has  since  done  her  duty  cheerfully. 
I  will  leave  this  open  to  tell  you  how  Powell  is  to-morrow.  God 
bless  you,  my  beloved  husband. 

"  Thursday,  April  3,  1845.  Last  night  I  got  one  of  the  chamber- 
maids to  sleep  on  the  floor  in  Powell's  room.  This  relieved  my  mind 
very  much,  and  seemed  to  have  a  beneficial  effect  upon  Powell  ;  she 
was  calmer  and  had  a  peaceful,  though  sleepless,  night.  I  told  the 
chambermaid  I  would  pay  her  something  for  sleeping  with  her.  At 
one  time  I  thought  of  going  up  to  sleep  with  Helen  in  the  nursery, 
and  letting  Mary  Brown  sleep  with  Powell ;  at  another  of  sleeping 
with  her  myself  ;  but  in  both  cases  I  knew  I  should  go  without  sleep, 
and  perhaps  lay  myself  up  for  day  work  ;  and  I  thought  of  you  and 
my  precious  children,  and  that  my  duty  did  not  lie  in  that  direction, 
but  to  do  what  I  could  without  overtaxing  my  strength.  Did  I  do 
rightly  ? 

"  God  has  been  with  me,  my  precious  William,  in  this  hour  of 
affliction  ;  and,  though  convincing  me  of  sin,  so  that  I  have  been 
constrained  to  lay  my  hand  upon  my  mouth,  and  bow  in  the  dust, 
and  to  cry  out :  '  Unclean,  unclean  ! '  yet  leading  me  to  the  Saviour, 
and  truly  a  very  present  help  in  time  of  trouble.  When  my  heart 
has  failed  within  me,  and  I  have  longed  for  your  breast  to  lean  on, 
and  to  weep  out  my  very  soul,  I  have  turned  to  the  Saviour,  and 


28  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

felt  I  had  a  sympathizing  friend  there,  who  would  listen  to  my  griefs 
and  had  power  to  relieve  them,  or  grant  me  the  strength  of  an  ox  to 
bear  them.  Poor  Powell,  too,  has  been  comforted  and  strengthened, 
and  God  has  enabled  me,  too,  to  be  her  helper.  To-day  she  seems 
altogether  better.  Harriet  is  nearly  well,  and  all  the  rest  quite  well. 
My  complaint  is  no  worse.  J.  Walter  is  learning  shorthand  and 
attending,  for  one  dollar,  a  course  of  lectures  on  chemistry  and 
geology,  which  he  finds  very  interesting.  May  the  God  of  heaven 
protect  and  bless  you,  my  beloved  husband. 

"Thine  own  "H.  W." 

"  1246  miles  from  New  Orleans,  Fort  Smith,  borders  of  Choctaw  Ter- 
ritory and  the  United  States. 

"  Friday,  April  4,  1845. 
"  My  Blessed  Harriet  : 

"  I  wrote  last  to  you  a  few  lines  from  Little  Rock,  dated  Monday, 
March  31.  We  did  not  get  away  from  Little  Rock  that  day  until 
noon,  although  we  were  to  have  started  at  9  a.  m.  Owing  to  the 
low  state  of  the  river,  and  the  great  quantity  of  snags,  we  were 
obliged  to  lie-to  every  night,  and  on  Wednesday,  2d  inst.,  we  got 
aground  upon  a  snag,  and  lay  there  immovable  for  ten  mortal  hours, 
and  we  only  arrived  here  this  afternoon  at  five  o'clock.  The  scenery 
on  the  river  above  Little  Rock  is  much  more  interesting  than  that 
below  it,  and  in  some  places  it  really  is  magnificent — cliffs  rising 
perpendicularly  from  the  river,  three  to  five  hundred  feet  high, 
crowned  with  trees,  and  the  river  turning  and  winding  among  the 
rocks,  and  then  opening  into  a  long  reach  like  a  canal,  bordered  with 
trees,  and  apparently  blocked  up  with  mountains  at  the  farther  end, 
beyond  which,  in  the  evening,  the  sun  would  set  gorgeously.  Some 
of  the  cliffs  are  finer  than  anything  on  the  Hudson. 

"  There  are  fine  barracks  building  here  for  the  United  States 
troops,  and  there  is  a  prettily  situated  town  of  about  eight  hundred 
or  one  thousand  inhabitants.  We  saw  a  great  number  of  Indians  this 
evening — men,  women,  and  papooses,  most  of  the  men  under  the 
influence  of  '  fire  water.'  At  one  end  of  the  town  is  a  large  post, 
which  marks  the  boundary  of  the  United  States  and  the  beginning 
of  the  Choctaw  Territory.  We  all  walked  across  the  line,  and  a 
short  way  into  the  Territory,  so  that  I  have  to-day  been  actually  to 


JOURNEY   TO   FORT   SMITH,   ARK.  29 

the  west  of  the  United  States,  and  beyond  the  State  of  Arkansas. 
If  the  water  had  not  been  so  low,  the  steamer  would  have  proceeded 
to  Fort  Gibson,  seventy  or  eighty  miles  further  up  in  the  Cherokee 
Territory,  but,  as  it  is,  we  begin  our  return  voyage  to  Little  Rock 
to-morrow,  which  I  am  right  glad  of,  as  I  feel  very  anxious  to  be 
progressing  homeward. 

"  About  five  or  six  miles  below  this  is  the  thriving  town  of  Van 
Buren,  containing  eight  hundred  inhabitants,  and  near  it  and  Fort 
Smith  are  large  bodies  of  our  lands.  I  find  that  our  lands  in  this 
vicinity  are  good  and  valuable,  but  what  is  wanted  is  a  trustworthy 
agent,  on  the  spot,  to  dispose  of  them,  and  that,  I  fear,  is  what  we 
are  not  soon  to  find.  There  is  a  hill  some  five  hundred  feet  high  just 
above  Van  Buren,  which  Pelton,  Davis,  and  I  ascended  to-day,  and 
had  a  most  extensive  and  magnificent  view  from  it.  We  saw  moun- 
tains distinctly,  said  to  be  eighty  miles  off,  and  looked  over  our  lands, 
and  we  also  saw  a  large  prairie,  like  a  great  park  without  trees  upon 
it.  All  the  rest  of  the  country  is  thickly  wooded,  and  too  much 
wood  renders  a  country  nearly  as  monotonous  as  too  little,  but  the 
scenery  to-day  was  varied  by  moutains  all  around  the  horizon,  and 
the  river  winding  at  our  feet.  It  will  be  a  glorious  country  some 
150  years  after  this,  when  it  is  well  cleared  and  thickly  peo- 
pled. There  is  a  Mr.  Stanley,  an  artist,  at  Van  Buren,  who  has 
been  sketching  Indians  and  scenery  in  this  State  ;  we  saw  some  of 
his  pictures  ;  two  landscapes  were  beautiful,  and  I  fancy  he  intends 
to  take  his  pictures  to  Europe,  so  that  the  Arkansas  scenery  may 
yet  become  known  to  fame.  The  weather  has  been  extremely  hot 
to-day. 

"  I  do  long  to  see  you  and  the  children  again.  I  prayed  for  you 
and  them  individually  in  the  Choctaw  Territory  this  afternoon, 
which  is  the  farthest  west  that  prayers  have  ascended  to  the  Throne 
of  Grace  for  you  and  them. 

"  Davis,  Pelton,  and  I  are  staying  on  board  the  steamer  to-night, 
as  it  is  needless  changing  our  beds  for  a  night,  although  it  is  not 
specially  comfortable  here.  They  have  gone  to  the  inn  to  see  a 
Captain  Alexander  of  the  United  States  Army,  a  fellow-passenger 
who  leaves  us  here  to  find  his  way  to  Fort  Towson  on  the  Red 
River,  and  if  I  had  no  wife  or  children,  I  would  have  liked  nothing 
better  than  to  have  gone  with  him,  as  his  road  lies  for  160  miles 


30  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

through  the  Indian  Territory,  and  he  will  need  to  sleep  at  the 
Indian  villages.  I  declined  the  invitation  to  the  inn,  as  I  wanted 
to  write  to  you,  and  Mr.  De  Peyster,  if  I  can  manage  it,  and  probably 
begin  letters  to  Mary,  Anna,  and  John  Dennistoun,  as  I  dare  say 
they  would  like  to  have  a  letter  from  this  place.  I  am  quite  well 
in  health,  but  pretty  well  tired  of  steamboat  traveling,  and  very 
anxious  about  you,  my  precious  one,  and  the  dear  children.  I  hope 
poor  Powell  is  better. 

"  Unless  we  can  progress  faster  than  we  have  hitherto  done,  I 
see  little  chance  of  getting  home  before  May  i.  I  intend  to  put 
this  into  the  post  office  at  Van  Buren  as  we  pass  down  to-morrow, 
although  I  am  not  sure  that  this  will  reach  you  any  sooner  than 
my  next  letter,  which  I  hope  to  be  from  Little  Rock,  but  when  I 
reach  it  depends  on  our  luck  on  not  getting  aground  in  going 
down.  The  stage  for  Washington  starts  from  Little  Rock  only 
three  times  a  week,  and  if  we  arrive  there  late  the  night  before 
the  stage  starts,  it  is  possible  I  may  not  be  able  to  write  to  you 
from  Little  Rock,  but  I  shall  try  and  do  so,  and  I  trust  in  God 
the  letter  I  get  there  from  you  may  bring  me  good  news  of  you 
and  my  dear  children.  By  the  way,  I  saw  a  child  here  to-night 
nine  months  old,  a  boy,  whose  arms  were  as  thick  as  mine,  and  his 
thighs  as  thick  as  mine.  He  was  a  perfect  monster,  but  apparently 
quite  healthy.  God  bless  and  watch  over  you,  my  beloved  one. 
Kiss  Johnnie  and  Charlotte,  Bessie  and  Harriet,  Willie  and  Helen, 
for  me,  two  by  two,  in  couples,  and  give  Johnnie  a  good  smack. 
"  Ever  your  own  attached 

"  Wm.  W." 


CHAPTER    III. 

RETURN     FROM    FORT    SMITH,    TO    NEW    ORLEANS    AND     JOURNEY    UP 
THE    RED    RIVER. 

"  April  5,  1845,  3.15  p.  m.  We  have  just  got  under  way  from  Fort 
Smith  on  our  return  down  the  river.  I  intend  to  put  this  into  the 
post  office  at  Van  Buren.  I  am  glad  to  say  that  at  Fort  Smith  I 
obtained  a  rather  satisfactory  report  on  the  value  of  our  lands  up  in 
this  section  of  the  country,  and  if  the  report  be  true,  the  Arkansas 
lands  may  not,  after  all,  prove  such  a  bad  spec.  We  all  dined  and 
breakfasted  at  the  hotel  here,  and  rejoiced  in  fresh  butter  and  good 
milk  after  our  privation  of  both.  Fort  Smith  is  really  a  pretty 
place.  We  walked  out  to  the  camp  of  the  United  States  troops, 
about  i}{  mile  from  the  town,  and  were  introduced  by  Captain 
Alexander  to  two  of  the  officers,  who  were  very  polite,  gentle- 
manly fellows.  Captain  Alexander  made  each  of  us  a  present  of 
a  Bois  d'Aic  walking  stick,  the  growth  of  Arkansas.  We  have 
a  good  many  passengers,  and  expect  a  good  many  more  to  come 
in  at  Van  Buren,  and  I  am  rather  apprehensive  we  may  be 
doubled  in  our  staterooms,  which  will  be  a  bore. 

"  God  bless  and  watch  over  you,  my  beloved  one.  May  both  of 
us  and  our  dear  children  grow  in  grace  and  in  the  knowledge  of 
our  Lord  and  Saviour  Jesus  Christ. 

"  Ever  your  own  attached  husband, 

"  Wm.  W." 

In  going  up  the  Arkansas  on  April  2  I  saw  a  large  flock  of  green 
paroquets,  and  at  Morrison's  Bluff  we  got  three  large  drumfish  and 
a  catfish  like  nothing  I  ever  saw  before.  It  has  no  scales,  and  has 
long  spines  like  a  cat's  whiskers  all  round  its  mouth,  only  they  are 
soft  and  flexible. 

At  Van  Buren,  on  our  way  up  the  river,  in  the  studio  of  a  Mr. 
Stanley,  I  saw  paintings  of  some  pretty  scenes  in  the  south  of  Arkan- 


32  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

sas,  and  also  saw  in  his  studio  the  scalp  of  an  Indian,  quite  fresh, 
with  long,  black  hair.  The  flesh  was  semi-transparent  and  about 
one-quarter  of  an   inch   thick. 

We  went  ashore  on  April  3  when  ascending  the  river,  and  visited 
a  settler's  log  hut.  There  was  only  one  room  with  a  mud  floor. 
The  stars  were  visible  through  the  crevices  of  the  sides,  which 
were  entirely  composed  of  logs  and  the  interstices  filled  with  clay. 
Two  beds  only,  one  for  the  husband  and  wife  and  the  other  for 
the  children.  They  killed  a  rattlesnake  near  their  hut  last  summer 
6}(  feet  long.  Last  evening  they  killed  a  magnificent  otter,  for  the 
skin  of  which  a  man  on  board  the  Lucy  Long  gave  two  dollars,  and 
expects  to  sell  it  for  seven   dollars  in  Philadelphia. 

"New  Orleans,  Friday,  April  4,  1845. 
"My  Precious   Husband  : 

" '  Bless  the  Lord,  oh!  my  soul,  and  all  that  is  within  me  bless  his 
holy  name  !  '  Such,  dear  Will,  is  the  language  of  my  heart  to-day, 
and  I  hope  and  trust  you  will  open  and  read  this  letter  y^r^/,  before 
the  one  of  Tuesday  night,  as  it  will  spare  you  great  anxiety.  Poor 
Powell,  as  I  told  you  on  Wednesday  morning,  was  a  little  better,  and 
I  attributed  it  then  to  the  chambermaid  sleeping  beside  her,  but  Dr. 
Rushton  called  and  said  if  she  were  too  much  excited  by  leeches 
that  she  had  better  try  again  mustard  plasters  to  the  ankles  and  the 
wrists,  and  perhaps  if  there  were  rheumatism  flying  about  the  body, 
as  there  was  undoubtedly  about  the  heart,  it  would  help  to  draw  it 
down  and  fix  it  in  her  joints.  He  also  altered  the  medicines.  These 
medicines,  under  God,  have  succeeded.  She  soon  fell  into  a  pro- 
fuse perspiration,  then  into  a  sleep,  and  to-day  she  seems  an  altered 
creature,  full  of  gratitude  to  God  and  to  me.  She  is  very,  very  fee- 
ble, but  perspires  freely,  indeed,  is  absolutely  drenched  with  it,  and 
feels  rheumatic  pains  in  her  knees  and  fingers  while  the  heart  is  com- 
paratively at  rest.  Oh,  ray  darling  !  what  an  anxious  time  I  have 
had,  and  what  a  severe  turn  poor  Powell  has  had  ;  the  beating  of 
her  heart  through  her  clothes  and  the  vibrating  of  her  very  cap 
strings  was  most  distressing  to  witness  ;  the  fixedness  of  her  large 
black  eyes,  the  short,  quick  cough,  incessantly  going,  and  the  feel- 
ing of  suffocation  she  endured.  The  doctor  says  she  is  to  continue 
the  medicine  and  the  blisters,  which  are  put  on   from  time  to  time 


RETURN  FROM  FORT  SMITH  TO  NEW  ORLEANS.     33 

through  the  day,  and  that  a  few  days  will  make  a  great  difference  on 
her  for  the  better.  Her  uncle  was  here,  poor  old  man,  much 
affected,  but   I  could   not   let  him  see  her. 

"  Well,  darling,  now  that  my  pen  has,  as  fast  as  my  hand  could 
guide  it,  told  you  the  good  news,  let  me  thank  you  and  thank  God 
for  your  fifth  precious  letter  from  Little  Rock,  received  last  night. 
After  reading,  though  grieved  to  hear  that  you  had  such  a  trial  of 
patience  to  endure,  yet  how  rejoiced  I  felt  to  hear  of  your  safety, 
and  that  you  had  nothing  worse  to  tell  me,  and  that  your  cold  had 
soon  passed  off.  I  have  felt  inclined  to  weep  and  pray  and  sing 
and  dance  all  through  to-day,  and  I  bless  God  that  my  letter  of  bad 
news  has  been  detained  to  go  along  with  this.  Fervently  do  I  re- 
echo your  prayer  that  you  may  never  again  leave  me  for  such  a 
length  of  time. 

"  Our  dear  children  continue  well,  and  poor  Mary  Brown  is  in  great 
distress.  She  had  told  me  she  was  to  be  married  on  May  i,  as  Carr 
would  wait  no  longer.  This,  as  you  may  judge,  added  to  my  distress, 
for  if  Mrs.  Slidell's  servant  could  come  to  me  on  June  i,  I  knew  that 
would  be  the  very  soonest — as  Mrs.  S.  does  not  go  herself  North  till 
the  end  of  June,  and  could  not  spare  her  so  long  before.  Well,  some 
man — an  elderly  and  respectable  man — called  here  and  asked  to  see 
Mary.  She  did  not  see  him,  but  he  said  to  the  office  men  downstairs 
i\\ditCa.xr  was  a  married  ?nan,  with  two  children  in  New  York,  and  that 
he  knew  him  for  a  long  time,  and  wished  to  tell  Mary  so.  She  called 
upon  him  the  next  day  at  the  St.  Charles  Hotel,  where  he  is  night 
watchman,  and  he  then  denied  that  he  knew  positively  that  Carr  had  a 
wife,  but  some  woman  he  knew,  he  had  supposed  to  be  his  wife,  and 
that  Carr  had  said  he  was  married.  To-night  she  intends  to  con- 
front the  two,  and  if  all  doubts  be  not  quite  cleared  away  to  discard 
him. 

"The  man  has  just  come  in  to  set  the  table,  and  the  gong 
sounds  for  three,  and  as  this  must  be  at  the  office  by  half  past,  I 
must  not  write  more.  Murray  T.  has  just  called  to  tell  me  of  this 
opportunity.  The  servant  would  not  come  to  sleep  with  Powell  last 
night,  and  she  had  a  good  night  without  her,  so  I  have  saved  my 
money  as  well  as  got  an  additional  proof  of  Powell's  improved  state. 
God  bless  you,  my  own  precious  Will. 

"Thine  own  "H." 


34  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  Steamer  Lucy  Long,  aground  about  two  miles  below  Lewisburg,  in 
the  Arkansas  River, 

"  Thursday,  April  lo,  1845. 
"  My  Beloved  Wife  : 

"  Here  we  are  stuck  about  sixty  miles  above  Little  Rock,  instead 
of  having  reached  that  place,  as  we  ought  to  have  done,  two  days  ago. 
We  are  now  lying  on  a  sand  bar,  where  we  got  aground  this  morn- 
ing, close  beside  the  wreck  of  the  Arkansas  No.  3,  which  got  snagged 
here  last  May.  We  have  been  aground  for  hours,  I  don't  know  how 
often  on  our  way  down,  and  have  twice  carried  away  large  portions 
of  our  paddle-wheels,  which  it  took  us  several  hours  to  repair.  The 
water  is  unprecedentedly  low  and  the  snags  unprecedentedly  numer- 
ous, but  we  had  hoped  we  were  clear  of  all  obstructions  when  we 
made  fast  for  the  night  last  evening,  and  that  we  should  have 
reached  Little  Rock  to-night.  However,  here  we  are  pretty  hope- 
lessly hard  and  fast,  and  when  we  shall  reach  Little  Rock  I  don't 
know.  I  have  been  most  impatient  to  get  home  many  times,  and 
have  just  had  to  be  patient  and  begin  again,  as  we  can't  help  our- 
selves ;  but  I  have  been  detained  so  long  on  this  part  of  my  tour, 
that  unless  I  can  get  to  Ecore  Fabre,  or  Camden,  as  it  is  now  called, 
on  the  Washita  River  direct  from  Little  Rock,  I  will  just  come  home 
by  the  nearest  way — that  is,  the  way  I  came,  for  I  am  most  anxious 
to  see  you  all,  and  it  is  no  fault  of  mine  that  I  have  been  so  long 
detained  on  this  portion  of  my  journey.  However,  if  we  can  get 
direct  from  Little  Rock  to  Camden,  and  should  be  fortunate  enough 
to  get  a  steamer  on  our  arrival  at  the  latter  place  ready  to  start  for 
New  Orleans,  I  should  reach  home  that  way  as  soon  as  any,  and  see 
the  south  of  the  State,  where  much  of  our  land  lies  over  and  above. 
Pelton  and  Davis  got  desperately  homesick  a  week  ago,  and  were 
determined  to  return  straight  home  from  Little  Rock.  However,  I 
talked  them  both  over  not  to  part  company.  Indeed,  each  said  he 
would  stick  by  me  if  the  other  left,  and  at  that  time  I  was  determined 
to  go  on  if  they  both  left,  and  told  them  so,  and  that,  although  of 
course  I  should  prefer  much  to  have  them,  yet  I  did  not  wish  to 
keep  them  if  they  desired  much  to  go  ;  but  I  said  I  knew  neither  of 
them  was  so  anxious  to  get  home  as  I  was,  but  yet  I  was  not  going 
to  return  without  carrying  out  my  original  intention  of  seeing  the 


RETURN  FROM  FORT  SMITH  TO  NEW  ORLEANS.     35 

south  of  Arkansas.  Since  then,  however,  our  detentions  have  been 
so  numerous,  and  so  much  time  lost,  that,  unless  we  can  charter  a 
conveyance  to  take  us  direct  to  Camden  from  Little  Rock,  instead 
of  going  round  by  Washington,  Hempstead  County,  I  shall  be 
obliged  to  give  in,  and  shall  not  at  all  regret  that  in  these  various 
delays  I  have  a  decent  excuse  for  doing  so.  It  is  three  weeks  this 
blessed  day  since  I  left  you  and  all  my  dear  ones,  and  supposing 
even  I  were  at  Little  Rock,  I  could  not  get  home  in  less  than  a 
week  or  ten  days. 

"However,  there  is  no  use  in  fretting,  here  we  are,  and  here  we 
must  stay,  until  we  can  work  off  or  over  the  bar.  The  day  is  boil- 
ing hot,  which  is  a  contrast  to  the  weather  we  have  lately  had, 
when  fires  morning  and  evening  have  been  quite  agreeable.  I 
have  noted  all  the  little  incidents  of  our  voyage  in  my  journal,  and 
hope  God  in  his  mercy  will  spare  us  to  meet  and  laugh  over  my 
difficulties  together.  The  night  before  last  I  saw  a  fish-hawk  fly 
over  the  steamer  with  a  good-sized  fish  in  its  talons,  and  I  have  seen 
many  tortoises  swimming  in  the  river  and  lying  on  logs  by  its  side. 
I  also  saw  a  flock  of  green  paroquets  on  my  way  up,  which  ornitho- 
logical, ichthyological,  and  zoological  facts  may  interest  John 
Walter,  and  he  will  tell  you  what  Greek  words  these  three  jaw- 
breakers are  derived  from. 

"  I  have  thought  much  of  you  and  my  dear  children,  and  have 
had  you  all  dead  and  buried  repeatedly,  but  this  is  unbelief  in 
God's  mercy,  and  I  am  sure  no  one  has  more  reason  than  I  to  say, 
'  Hitherto  hath  the  Lord  helped  me.' 

"  The  life  on  board  a  steamer  is  pretty  like  being  at  sea,  except 
that  there  is  no  swell,  and  rather  more  variety,  but  not  much  more 
than  sailing  through  the  West  India  Islands  and  by  Florida,  as  we 
did.  There  are,  besides  our  own  party,  several  pleasant  and  gentle- 
manly men  on  board.  Among  these  is  Major  Hunter  of  the  United 
States  Army,  who,  if  we  go  by  Camden,  will  perhaps  join  our  party  ; 
Colonel  George  C.  Washington,  a  grand-nephew  both  by  his  father's 
and  mother's  side  of  the  '  Father  of  his  Country,'  whose  seal  he  has 
and  of  which  I  have  got  some  impressions.  He  is  a  man  of  about 
forty,  with  hair  very  like  mine,  and  said  his  great  relative  had  also 
light  hair  (say  red  or  amber).     He  is  a  good  deal  like  the  pictures 


36  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

of  Washington,  and  will  be  liker  as  he  gets  older.  It  is  curious  that 
his  seal  was  lost  when  he  was  out  hunting,  and  could  not  be  found 
for  twenty  years,  when  it  was  dug  up  on  his  own  estate  by  one  of 
his  own  negroes,  and,  what  is  a  remarkable  coincidence,  a  gentleman 
of  the  name  of  Johnson  on  board  has  an  old-fashioned  silver  seal 
with  the  initials  '  G.  W.,'  which  was  picked  up  by  a  Colonel  Logan 
on  the  field  of  Braddock's  defeat  (where  George  Washington  took 
command  after  Braddock's  death),  some  ten  years  ago.  Colonel 
Washington  says  he  has  not  the  least  doubt  that  it  is  a  seal  lost  by 
Washington  on  the  field  of  battle.  There  is  an  old,  white-headed 
gentleman,  a  Colonel  Armistead,  on  board  ;  he  and  Washington  are 
commissioners  from  the  United  States  to  the  Indians,  and  have  been 
up  among  the  Cherokees  for  three  months.  We  have  three  Cherokee 
Indians  on  board  on  their  way  to  Washington.  One  of  them, '  Van,' 
is  a  very  good-looking,  pleasant  old  gentleman  ;  he  is  a  chief, 
although  about  three-quarters  white.  It  is  so  hot  I  will  stop  for  the 
present.     God  bless  you,  my  dearest  one, 

"Little  Rock,  April  ii,  1845. 
"  I  only  arrived  here  this  afternoon,  having  broken  our  paddle 
twice  on  snags  and  rocks,  and  got  aground  times  without  number, 
I  got  your  dear  letter  of  March  24,  and  was  grieved  to  learn  of  your 
bad  spirits,  and  of  Powell's  continued  illness,  and  poor  wee  Harriet's 
illness.  I  found  that  it  would  take  me  at  least  five  days  to  reach 
Ecore  Fabre  or  Camden,  and  that  at  this  late  period  of  the  season 
I  might  be  detained  there  ten  days  or  a  fortnight  waiting  for  a 
steamer,  and  both  Pelton  and  Davis  were  most  anxious  to  get  home, 
and  so  was  I,  and  your  letter  made  me  doubly  so,  and  I  have  duties 
to  my  wife  and  children,  as  well  as  to  my  partners,  and  so  I  have 
determined  to  set  off  homeward  to-morrow,  going  by  stage  from  this 
to  Rock  Row,  and  from  thence,  per  steamer  down  the  White  River, 
to  a  place  called  Montgomery's  Point,  on  the  Mississippi.  This  will 
both  vary  our  route  and  probably  bring  us  twelve  hours  sooner  to 
the  Mississippi,  than  by  continuing  on  board  the  Lzicy  Long,  of  which 
we  are  heartily  tired.  Colonel  Washington  goes  with  us.  I  think  I 
shall  stop  a  day  at  Natchez,  to  see  Mr.  Davis,  Sr.,  and  our  lawyers 
there,  and  I  may  probably  go  with  Mr.  Mylne  to  Alexandria  on 
Red  River,  for  a  week  at  the  end  of  this  month  ;  but  this  will  depend 


RETURN   FROM   FORT   SMITH   TO   NEW   ORLEANS.  3/ 

upon  how  you  and  the  children  are.     God  bless  and  watch  over  you 
and  them,  and  unite  us  all  again  in  health  of  body  and  mind. 
"  Ever  your  attached  husband, 

"  William  Wood." 


"  Steamer  Independence,  Mississippi  River. 
"  Monday,  April  14,  1845. 
"  My  Beloved  Harriet  : 

"  I  wrote  to  you  last  from  Little  Rock  on  my  way  back  from  Fort 
Smith,  but  it  is  a  great  chance  if  you  get  that  letter  before  you 
receive  this,  so  I  may  shortly  say  that  I  found  from  the  long  deten- 
tion we  had  suffered  in  the  upper  Arkansas,  and  the  lateness  of  the 
season,  that  if  I  came  home  by  the  Washita,  I  might  be  three  weeks 
or  more  in  reaching  New  Orleans,  so  I  determined  to  return  the 
nearest  way  home,  which  was  across  the  country  by  way  of  White 
River.  Accordingly,  on  Saturday  morning,  April  12,  your  thirty- 
fifth  birthday,  we  started  before  6  o'clock,  a.  m.,  in  a  stage,  and  for 
a  place  called  Rock  Row  or  Rockroe,  about  sixty-three  miles  nearly 
due  east  from  Little  Rock.  I  sat  on  the  box  with  the  driver,  in 
order  to  see  the  country.  The  first  fifteen  miles  lay  through  the 
forest  and  over  a  pretty  rough  road,  but  after  that  we  got  upon  a  mag- 
nificent prairie,  which  is  ninety-seven  miles  long,  by  forty-six  broad. 
We  drove  right  across  it.  It  is  not  entirely  destitute  of  trees,  but  is 
dotted  with  clumps  of  them  here  and  there,  as  if  they  had  been 
planted  on  purpose  to  improve  the  scenery.  There  are  sometimes 
eight  or  nine  miles  without  any  trees,  but  always  in  this  prairie  the 
horizon  is  bordered  by  the  forest.  There  are  many  flowers  of  bril- 
liant colors,  and  the  grass  at  this  season  is  as  green  as  emerald.  We 
saw  flocks  of  prairie  hens,  partridges,  and  plovers,  and  several  deer. 
I  was  delighted  with  the  drive  ;  we  had  excellent  horses  all  the  way, 
and  changed  every  ten  miles. 

"  We  breakfasted  at  eight  o'clock  in  a  log-cabin,  which  was  very 
clean  and  tidy,  and  we  had  fresh  milk  and  butter,  eggs,  venison, 
flour  and  corn  bread,  etc.,  with  coffee.  We  dined  at  twelve, 
in  another  log-cabin  in  the  middle  of  the  prairie,  and  had  just 
the  breakfast  repeated,  including  coffee.  We  arrived  at  Rockroe 
on  the  White  River,  about  5  p.  m.  ;  this  is  a  large  farmhouse 
and  hotel  built  of  logs  belonging  to  the  stage-owner,  a  Mr.  Lemon, 


38  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

who  I  found  out  was  a  Glasgow  man,  although  he  had  left  that 
renowned  city  when  he  was  seven  weeks  old.  There  was  a 
number  of  passengers  at  Rockroe  from  New  Orleans,  waiting  to  go 
on  by  the  next  day's  stage  to  Little  Rock.  So  after  washing  our 
faces  and  hands  in  a  tin  basin,  which  stood  at  the  door,  and  wiping 
ditto  on  a  jack-towel  hung  over  a  roller,  we  went  down  to  the 
steamer,  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile's  walk,  through  a  pine  forest. 
She  was  a  good  deal  superior  to  i\\Q  Lucy  Long,  although  also  a  small 
boat.  We  each  got  a  stateroom,  and  were  delighted  to  find  the  White 
River  fine  and  deep,  and  we  ran  the  140  miles  to  Montgomery's  Point, 
at  its  entrance  into  the  Mississippi,  very  comfortably.  Montgomery's 
Point  is  one  of  the  most  cut-throat  places  on  the  Mississippi,  but  it 
was  perfectly  quiet  when  I  saw  it. 

"  I  here  put  into  the  post  office  letters  which  I  had  written  to 
Mary,  Anna,  and  John  Dennistoun,  to  go  by  the  steamer  of 
May  I.  They  will  go  across  the  Alleghanies  to  New  York, 
instead  of  going  to  New  Orleans.  We  only  remained  an  hour 
at  Montgomery's  Point,  when  the  Chicago  steamer  took  us  on 
to  Napoleon  at  the  mouth  of  the  Arkansas.  Here  we  got  out  to 
wait  for  a  steamer  to  take  us  to  New  Orleans,  and  shortly  the 
Mazeppa  hove  in  sight,  but  although  the  bell  at  the  wharf-boat  was 
rung  for  her  to  stop,  she  '  passed  us  by  on  the  other  side  ; '  she  was 
deeply  loaded  with  cotton.  However,  there  was  some  alleviation  to 
our  feelings  at  being  left.  I  forgot  to  say  Colonel  Washington  joined 
us  on  our  trip  by  White  River,  and  a  very  pleasant,  gentlemanly 
man  he  is  ;  really  a  gentleman  like  his  great  relative,  and  also  very 
like  my  father.  Well,  after  reading  all  the  newspapers  at  the  post 
office  at  Napoleon,  and  being  pretty  well  tired  waiting  for  four  or 
five  hours,  another  steamer  hove  in  sight,  which  proved  to  be  the 
Lndependence  from  St.  Louis.  We  got  on  board  and  found  her  to  be 
a  fine,  large  handsome  boat,  and  as  there  were  no  ladies  on  board, 
we  each  got  a  stateroom  in  the  ladies'  cabin.  We  are  now  about  half- 
way between  Princeton  and  Vicksburg,  and  I  expect  to  reach 
Natchez  late  to-night,  or  early  to-morrow  morning.  I  intend  to 
remain  there  a  day  to  see  Mr.  Davis,  Sr.,  about  the  lands,  and  also 
to  see  our  lawyers.  It  will  depend  upon  when  I  can  get  a  steamer 
at  Natchez,  at  what  time  I  will  reach  New  Orleans,  but  I  should 
think  some  time  on  Thursday  or  Friday;  when  I  trust  in  God  I  may 


RETURN  FROM  FORT  SMITH  TO  NEW  ORLEANS.     39 

find  you  and  all  my  dear  ones  well.  I  have  been  longer  hearing 
from  you  than  I  ever  was  in  my  life  before  ;  even  longer  than  when  I 
was  at  Trieste.  I  think  if  we  are  all  spared  in  good  health  to  return 
up  the  Mississippi,  and  have  a  good  boat  and  deep  water,  we  shall 
quite  enjoy  the  trip.  Even  a  voyage  to  Liverpool,  with  you  and  the 
dear  children  beside  me,  has  now  no  disgust  for  me.  God  bless 
you,  my  beloved  one  !  Give  my  kindest  love  to  J.  Walter,  Charlotte, 
Bessie,  Harriet,  and  Willie.  Kiss  little  Miss  Helen  forme. 
"  Ever  your  own  attached  husband, 

"  Wm.  W. 
"  P.  S. — Since  writing  the  foregoing  we  have  passed  Vicksburg, 
where  I  have  ascertained  that  the  steamer  Luda  leaves  Natchez  for 
New  Orleans  on  Wednesday  evening,  so  that  if  I  do  not  get  an 
opportunity  before  her  I  intend  coming  down  per  Z/^^(^ir,  which  ought 
to  put  me  in  New  Orleans  in  the  course  of  Friday.  Again,  God 
bless  you.  "  Ever  your  own, 

"  Wm.  W." 

notes  from  my  diary. 

"  Tuesday,  April  15,  1845.  I  landed  at  Natchez  on  my  way  from 
Arkansas  to  New  Orleans,  a  little  before  4  a.  m.,  pitch  dark.  Ben, 
the  black  porter,  was  sleeping  at  the  wharf-boat,  and  carried  up 
Davis'  baggage  and  mine,  and  also  Mr.  Roberts'  ;  he  is  the  agent 
for  the  U.  S.  Bank  at  Natchez,  and  joined  us  at  Vicksburg.  He  had 
with  him  a  negro  man  and  woman  and  their  two  little  children  ;  they 
looked  very  melancholy.  I  fancy  he  had  got  them  in  payment  of 
some  debt,  and  was  taking  them  to  Natchez  for  sale. 

"  Went  to  bed  and  rose  again  at  seven.  After  breakfast  went  to 
Ferriday's.  They  advised  me  to  sell  the  warehouse  to  Fisk  instead  of 
leasing  it,  as  he  is  so  changeable  he  may  give  up  business  in  a  year.  I 
also  saw  Chaplain,  one  of  our  lawyers,  who  told  me  they  had  got  Payne 
to  give  a  confession  of  judgment  for  the  ^38,000,  which  is  satis- 
factory, and  Eustis,  the  partner  of  Chaplain,  thinks  we  may  certainly 
count  on  his  paying  $20,000  out  of  next  crop,  as  the  Supreme  Court 
has  confirmed  the  judgment  of  the  Inferior  Courts  against  the  banks, 
thereby  relieving  Payne  from  any  immediate  pressure  in  that  quar- 
ter ;  and  also,  now  that  he  has  confessed  judgment,  if  he  do  not  keep 
his  engagements  he  knows  w-e  can  sell  him  up.     Eustis  and  Chaplain 


40  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

think  that,  unless  within  a  Aveek  the  Board  of  the  Planters'  Bank 
authorize  Mandeville  to  make  our  account  good,  we  had  better  write 
for  a  copy  of  the  whole  account  to  England.  I  told  Eustis  and 
Chaplain  that  if  Fisk  would  give  $7750  for  the  warehouse  I  would 
take  it ;  he  would  not,  however,  give  more  than  $7500,  and  not  that 
until  he  had  consulted  his  family. 

"I  had  a  long  talk  with  Mr.  Davis,  Sen.,  about  our  lands  ;  gave  him 
a  report  of  our  journey,  etc.;  he  told  me  that  a  Judge  Liddle  of 
Williams  County,  Mississippi,  where  he  has  a  plantation,  has  just 
been  over  in  Union  County,  Arkansas,  where  he  also  has  some  land, 
and  is  so  delighted  with  the  fertility  of  the  soil,  the  healthiness  of 
the  place,  and  the  fine  clear  streams  of  water,  that  he  is  moving  his 
negroes  there  to  begin  a  plantation.  He  has  been  on  the  Gwin  and 
Davis  lands  and  reports  them  the  best  selections  in  the  district,  says 
they  are  a  fortune  and  worth  $15  an  acre.  Mr.  Davis  is  quite 
'  vogie '  about  them,  and  says  he  would  not  sell  for  less  than  $10, 
and  that  he  is  sure  Wolfe  (of  New  York)  will  be  ill  pleased  at  the 
sales  made  of  his  at  $3.  I  spoke  to  him  of  Kinney,  and  also  about 
Forshey  as  land  agents.  Kinney  I  think  honest,  but  he  does  not 
look  very  efficient.  Forshey,  Davis  says,  is  poor  and  ambitious,  but 
hardly  to  be  trusted,  although  he  would  rather  trust  him  than  any 
one  he  has  seen  ;  but  he  has  been  so  cheated  by  land  agents  that  he 
is  not  willing  to  trust  any  of  them,  but  he  says  his  interests  in  the 
South  are  so  large  that  he  is  very  desirous  his  son-in-law.  Dr.  Paige, 
should  come  and  settle  in  the  South  instead  of  practicing  as  a  physi- 
cian in  Philadelphia,  and  he  thinks  he  would  make  a  good  agent  for 
selling  our  lands  ;  that  the  land  agency  alone  would  not  be  a  suffi- 
cient inducement  for  Dr.  Paige  to  leave  his  business,  but  Mr.  Davis 
could  hold  out  others  which  he  thinks  would  be  sufficient.  Davis 
represents  Paige  as  highly  honorable  and  trustworthy,  firm  and  sen- 
sible ;  he  was  born  and  bred  in  Virginia,  in  the  country,  and  would 
soon  know  all  about  the  land  ;  has  many  relations  among  the  leading 
families  of  Virginia,  some  of  whom  he  could  probably  induce  to 
emigrate  to  Arkansas,  and,  at  any  rate,  he  would  go  back  to  Arkan- 
sas in  the  fall  and  remain  there  to  receive  immigrants  and  show 
the  lands  during  the  season.  Davis  added,  *  Don't  take  my  word 
about  Paige,  ask  Mr.  Mylne  about  him,  and  then,  when  I  go  to  Phila- 
delphia in  July,  come  there  and  see  him  yourself,  and  if  you  are  not 


RETURN   FROM   FORT   SMITH   TO   NEW   ORLEANS.  4I 

satisfied  that  he  will  be  an  efficient  and  good  agent  in  every  way 
don't  take  him.'  Davis  added  that  hitherto  he  had  been  disgusted 
with  these  lands,  but  that  he  now  saw  they  were  getting  valuable 
and  that  the  time  was  approaching  when  we  should  be  prepared  with 
a  good  agent  for  selling.  He  says  the  lands  in  Union  County  alone 
will  pay  for  the  cost  of  the  whole.  He  also  thinks  we  should  get 
Gwin  to  abandon  his  interest  now,  in  case  there  should  be  a  profit 
realized.  I  don't  think  there  is  much  chance  of  a  profit  on  cost  with 
eight  per  cent,  interest  and  charges. 

"I  dined  with  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Davis,  and  after  dinner  was  introduced 
to  Mrs.  Robert  Cochrane,  a  nice  respectable  old  Scottish  lady,  with  a 
delightful  accent.  Before  dinner  I  rode  with  young  Davis  to  G.  W. 
Turner's  place,  near  Natchez,  a  fine  house,  well  furnished.  G.  W. 
Turner  is  as  thin  as  his  brother  Henry  is  fat,  and,  if  possible,  more 
silent ;  but  he  is  more  gentlemanly. 

"  The  country  about  Natchez  is  really  perfectly  lovely  at  this  season 
and  quite  odoriferous  with  the  smell  of  roses,  catalpas,  pride  of 
India,  etc.  The  land  is  very  undulating  and  covered  with  green- 
sward, and  splendid  trees,  and  more  roses  than  I  ever  saw  before. 
A  small  double  rose,  called  '  multiflora,'  about  many  of  the  resi- 
dences, is  turned  spirally  up  the  trunks  of  the  huge  forest  trees  and 
the  effect  is  '  beautiful  exceedingly.' 

"  After  dinner  we  mounted  our  horses  again  and  rode  to  Dr. 
Duncan's  residence  at  Auburn,  and  a.  lovely  spot  it  is.  A  first-rate 
substantial  brick  mansion,  with  beautiful,  well-kept  grounds.  Dr. 
Duncan  was  not  at  home,  but  Mrs.  Duncan,  two  young  ladies,  and  a 
son  were.  Mrs.  Duncan,  a  very  ladylike,  pleasant,  conversible 
woman  ;  Miss  Charlotte  Duncan,  very  like  poor  Charlotte  Kane, 
dark,  with  black  eyes,  very  pleasant  and  a  great  deal  to  say.  I  gave 
them  an  account  of  our  Arkansas  trip,  etc.  We  then  rode  to  General 
Quitman's,  also  a  fine  place  ;  he  has  eight  children,  seven  of  them 
daughters.  I  saw  three  little  girls,  fine  healthy,  pretty  children. 
Mrs.  Quitman  was  unfortunately  engaged  in  some  domestic  duties, 
and  the  eldest  daughter,  who  is  a  beauty,  we  did  not  see.  We  rode 
back  to  Natchez  in  the  moonlight.  I  have  done  what  I  could  in  the 
way  of  setting  young  Davis  a  good  example.  He  is  a  fine-hearted 
young  man,  but  will  have  many  trials  and  temptations  from  not  being 


42  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

able  to  say  No.  He  is  very  good-looking  and,  I  think,  'not  far  from 
the  kingdom  of  God.'     I  wish  him  well. 

"  Old  Mr.  Davis  said  that  there  has  been  more  talk  and  interest 
shown  about  Arkansas  in  Natchez  since  we  went  away  up  there  than 
there  has  ever  been  before,  and  quite  a  sensation  about  it.  He 
advises  me  not  to  sell  the  warehouse  even  for  ten  thousand  dollars. 
It  will  be  worth  that,  he  says,  in  six  months,  and  he  bets  me  a  hat 
that  the  property  we  took  over  from  him  in  New  Orleans  will  be 
worth  twenty-five  per  cent,  more  than  we  paid  him  for  it. 

"  I  had  just  got  back  to  the  hotel  and  packed  my  things,  which 
had  got  wet  in  my  forenoon's  ride,  when  *  Ben  '  told  me  a  boat  was 
in  sight  from  the  bluff.  This  proved  to  be  the  Queen  City,  a  fine 
large  steamer  from  Cincinnati.     Mr.  Davis  went  down  to  see  me  off. 

"  April  1 6, 1845.  On  board  the  Queen  City.  Had  to  lie-to  nearly 
all  last  night  owing  to  fog,  and  shall  not  reach  New  Orleans  till  to- 
morrow. It  is  odd  that  I  feel  vastly  disposed,  if  Harriet  and  the 
children  keep  their  health,  to  stay,  if  we  be  spared,  another  year  in 
America.  I  suppose  my  pleasant  visit  to  Natchez  has  given  rise  to 
this  feeling.  I  have  always  thought  I  ought  to  stay,  but  latterly  I 
have  disliked  the  idea  of  doing  so.  I  hate  the  thought  of  bidding  a 
final  adieu  to  all  our  New  York  friends  ;  at  the  same  time  I  would 
like  to  see  Eliza  and  be  settled  at  home,  near  our  own  church. 
However,  all  this  is  decided  for  us  already  by  our  Father  in  Heaven, 
and  the  decision  could  not  be  in  better  hands.  Let  me  learn  in 
whatsoever  state  I  am  therewith  to  be  content. 

"  I  have  no  written  document  to  show  what  I  did  from  April  17, 
when  I  must  have  arrived  in  New  Orleans  from  Natchez,  till  April 
26,  1845,  when  I  set  off  on  my  travels  again,  to  visit  some  of  our 
debtor  planters  on  the  Red  River  of  Louisiana,  but  my  recollection 
is  that  Harriet  was  far  from  well,  and  in  delicate  health  all  the 
nine  days  that  I  remained  with  her  in  New  Orleans.  On  Sat- 
urday, April  26,  1845,  at  6  p.  m.,  I  left  New  Orleans  in  the 
steamer  De  Soto,  with  Dr.  John  Seip  and  John  M.  Pelton,  the 
latter  merely  accompanying  us  as  far  as  Donaldsonville  on  his  way 
home  to  Dalae.  I  accompanied  Dr.  Seip  to  Alexandria,  on  the  Red 
River,  and  from  thence  to  his  plantation,  about  seven  miles  from 
Alexandria." 

I  quote  from  my  diary  : 


RETURN  FROM  FORT  SMITH  TO  NEW  ORLEANS.     43 

"  I  left  New  Orleans  very  much  bothered  as  to  how  to  lay  mat- 
ters before  the  Trio  [Alexander  Dennistoun,  John  Dennistoun,  and 
William  Cross],  so  as  to  let  them  decide  upon  correct  grounds  as  to 
my  returning  here,  if  I  be  spared,  another  winter  or  not.  I  hate 
parting  with  Harriet  and  the  children,  although  my  intended  absence 
is  but  short.  Talked  with  Dr.  Seip  and  Pelton,  and  looked  over 
some  pictorial  papers  belonging  to  the  former.  He  and  I  are  in  one 
stateroom.  The  boat  crowded  with  passengers  ;  too  few  servants, 
and  not  very  abundant  or  very  good  fare  ;  went  to  bed  about  half- 
past  eight  ;  night  very  hot,  but  slept  pretty  well. 

"Sunday,  April  27,  1845.  Rose  before  6  a.  m.  and  dressed 
before  Dr.  Seip.  After  breakfast  read  several  chapters  of  the 
Bible  and  the  Book  of  Jonah  ;  then,  my  blessed  Harriet's  three 
epistles  and  Sam  Blackburn's  letter,  and  prayed  for  blessings  on 
my  dear  wife  and  children  and  all  connected  with  us,  and  for  guidance 
and  direction,  and  had  some  sweet  peace  and  comfort  in  thinking 
that  I  was  under  the  guidance  of  my  Heavenly  Father. 

**  They  sat  roasting  outside  and  reading  the  British  Quarterly, 
which  is  ponderously  heavy.  I  finished  the  '  Pilgrim  Fathers,'  and 
have  got  nearly  through  Ward's  '  Ideal  of  a  Christian  Church.' 

"  Was  introduced  to  Colonel  Bryce,  who  is  just  from  Washington. 
He  was  offered  the  embassy  to  Vienna,  four  thousand  dollars  per 
annum,  but  declined  it.  He  was  a  great  Polk  electioneerer.  He  is 
the  first  man  I  have  heard  justify  repudiation.  He  says  the  banks 
which  got  the  government  bonds  never  assisted  the  small  planters, 
who  pay  the  bulk  of  the  taxes,  but  only  the  larger  men  ;  so  the 
smaller  men  are  justified  in  not  paying.  He  says  no  public  man 
would  dare  to  propose  taxation  sufficient  to  meet  the  indebtedness 
of  Louisiana,  and  that  its  bonds  are  not  intrinsically  worth  twenty- 
five  cents.  He  said  the  European  bondholders  ought  to  reduce  the 
interest  to  2^  per  cent,  and  then  they  might  have  some  chance  of 
getting  paid.     I  find  that  one  arpent  is  yVoV  of  ^^  acre. 

"  Dr.  Seip  grows  enough  corn  for  his  negroes,  and  has  besides 
some  to  sell.  He  has  planted  100  acres  extra  this  year,  and  expects 
to  have  3000  bushels  to  sell  next  year  ;  has  358  acres  in  cotton, 
which,  barring  accidents,  ought  to  make  350  bales. 

"  Much  bothered  and  in  low  spirits  about  the  future,  and  about  stay- 
ing here  or  going  home.     Lord,  do  thou  undertake  for  me  and  mine  ! 


44  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"Monday,  April  28,  1845.  Dr.  Seip  told  me  that  $300  per 
annum  will  pay  all  his  family  expenses,  clothes  included,  and  his 
groceries,  meat,  etc.,  would  be  paid  by  $100  out  of  said  sum.  Any 
pocket  money  he  requires  he  makes  by  sale  of  butter,  milk,  etc. 
He  told  me  that  many  planters  in  his  neighborhood  had  applied  to 
him  for  introductions  to  A.  &  J.  Dennistoun  &  Co.,  but  he  had 
refused  to  give  them  because  Mr.  Mylne  had  said  he  did  not  want 
them,  as  they  all  required  advances  of  money.  Some,  Dr.  Seip  said, 
would  not — as  Mr.  Calhoun,  who  makes  3000  to  4000  bales  cotton, 
and  Mr.  Williams,  4000  to  5000  bales  ;  they  might  require  supplies, 
but  nothing  more.  There  are  also  several  small  planters  who  make 
100  to  200  bales,  and  are  perfectly  independent,  and  want  to  be 
introduced  to  A.  &  J.  Dennistoun  &  Co.  Dr.  Seip  says  our  sales  of 
his  cotton  are  always  about  one  cent  higher  than  his  neighbors  get 
for  theirs,  and  this  is  the  reason  why  so  many  planters  wish  to  be 
introduced  to  A.  &  J.  Dennistoun  &  Co. 

"  Tuesday,  April  29,  1845.  Arrived  yesterday  at  Alexandria 
about  3  p.  M.  Went  to  Mr.  Flint's  office  and  talked  over  the  mat- 
ter of  the  mortgage  on  Dr.  Seip's  plantation.  Flint  said  the  pay- 
ment of  ^11,000  to  the  Union  Bank  might  have  been  saved  but  for 
what  he  evidently  thought  A.  &  J.  Dennistoun  &  Co.'s  absurd  hon- 
esty. I  asked  how.  He  told  me  the  bank  did  not  know  of  the  lien 
until  told  by  A.  &  J.  D.  &  Co.,  and  would  hardly  believe  it  then. 
In  reference  to  this  affair  I  said,  on  the  principle  of  '  Do  unto  others 
as  you  would  be  done  by,'  we  were  bound  to  tell  the  bank.  He 
replied  any  lawyer  would  be  laughed  at  who  gave  his  client  such 
advice. 

"  Dr.  Seip's  house-boards  are  unpainted,  no  ceiling,  and  the  first 
light  in  the  morning  comes  through  chinks  in  the  walls  and  openings 
in  the  shingles  of  the  roof.  The  dividing  partition  of  my  bedroom 
from  the  sitting  room  does  not  go  clear  up  to  the  roof,  but  only  to 
that  part  of  the  walls  where  the  roof  springs  from  ;  so  that  I  could 
throw  a  ball  from  my  bedroom  into  the  parlor.  Mrs.  Seip  is  a 
ladylike  woman  of  about  twenty-five.  He  is  twenty-eight.  They 
have  two  children,  a  piano,  and  a  good  carriage  and  horses  ;  no  car- 
pets, no  paper  on  the  room-walls,  but  just  plain,  unpainted  boards. 

"  Dr.  Seip  gives  his  overseer,  a  Mr.  Dawson,  from  Vermont,  $roo 
per  annum  if  he  makes  100  bales  cotton  ;  ^200  if  he  makes  200 


RETURN  FROM  FORT  SMITH  TO  NEW  ORLEANS.     45 

bales  ;  $400  and  a  handsome  present  if  he  makes  300  bales.  Dr. 
Seip  has  49  slaves,  which  he  reckons  equal  to  30  hands,  some  being 
too  young  or  too  old  to  work  ;  he  has  25  mules,  8  yoke  of  old  oxen 
and  plenty  of  young  ones,  7  horses,  and  3  or  4  colts,  also  300  or 
400  pigs. 

"  Land  here  grows  two  crops  of  Indian  corn  per  annum.  The 
first,  sown  in  February,  ripens  about  June,  and  then  a  second  is 
sown  between  the  rows,  and  ripens  about  September.  Each  crop 
makes  about  30  bushels  to  the  acre.  In  Missouri  they  grow  65  to 
70  bushels  per  acre,  but,  then,  they  only  grow  one  crop  per  annum. 
My  authority  for  these  statements  is  Mr.  E.  H.  Flint,  a  son  of  Tim- 
othy Flint,  the  historian  of  the  Mississippi,  and  brother  of  Lawyer 
Flint,  Dr.  Seip's  brother-in-law.  E.  H.  Flint  has  three  fine  planta- 
tions, originally  owned  by  his  father-in-law,  General  Thomas,  and 
200  or  300  negroes.  He  is  a  pleasant  man,  and  recommends  us  to 
return  to  New  York  by  Cincinnati,  Cleveland,  etc. 

"April  30,  1845.  Drove  to  Alexandria  from  Oak  Isle,  Dr.  Seip's 
place,  about  seven  miles.  Dined  with  Mr.  James  T.  Flint,  the  law- 
yer. He  has  a  well-furnished  house,  excepting  that  there  are  no 
carpets.  A  negro  boy,  with  a  fan  of  peacock  feathers,  drove  away 
the  flies  during  dinner.  After  dinner  called  at  General  Thomas', 
and  saw  Mrs.  Thomas,  who  was  a  Miss  Flint,  and  had  a  regular 
Yankee  accent,  but  is  evidently  a  well-educated  woman, 

"  Got  on  board  the  De  Soto  to  return  to  New  Orleans  about  3 
p.  M.,  feeling  ill  and  out  of  sorts,  probably  from  riding  so  much  in 
the  sun.  Went  to  bed  early,  and  rose  at  6  a.  m.  on  Thursday,  May 
I,  1845.  Still  feverish,  and  my  tongue  feeling  as  if  it  were  boiled, 
and  bothered  to  death  about  what  to  write  to  the  Trio  regarding  my 
coming  home  this  year. 

**  There  are  on  board  the  De  Soto  two  convicts  in  fetters,  one  a 
murderer  and  the  other  a  forger,  going  to  Baton  Rouge  Peni- 
tentiary. The  forger  is  condemned  to  fourteen  years'  imprisonment 
and  the  murderer  to  twenty  years.  The  passengers  played  at  cards 
quite  amicably  with  the  convicts,  and  when  we  came  to  Baton 
Rouge  most  of  the  passengers  accompanied  them  to  the  prison  to 
see  their  hair  cut  and  their  prison  garments  put  on.  I  did  not  go 
with  the  crowd." 


CHAPTER   IV. 

RETURN     JOURNEY     TO    NEW      YORK      WITH      MY      FAMILY,     ARRIVING 

JUNE    25,    1845. 

"  On  May  8,  1845,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Scott  dined  with  us  at  the  St.  Louis 
Hotel.  He  told  us  that  the  schools  in  the  second  municipality  were 
free  to  all  without  charge,  and  that  the  municipality  also  supplied 
books  and  stationery.  All  branches  taught,  including  Latin,  and 
high  and  low  attend. 

"  May  14,  1845.  Visited  what  is  called  the  high  school  of  the 
second  municipality.  It  is  held  in  the  basement  of  Dr.  Scott's 
Church.  Boys,  in  order  to  enter  it,  must  have  passed  through  the 
lower  schools.  I  saw  the  boys  examined  in  arithmetic  and  English 
grammar.  The  lads  were  smart  and  intelligent-looking,  from  eleven 
to  sixteen  years  old.  They  had  a  sharp,  intelligent,  well-dressed 
master,  about  twenty-five.     The  school  was  well  ventilated. 

"May  22,  1845.  I  dined  at  Helen  Nicholson's.  The  party  con- 
sisted of  the  Rev.  Dr.  Hawks,  bishop-designate  of  Mississippi,  and 
recently  the  most  popular  preacher  of  the  Episcopal  Church  in  New 
York,  Lawyer  Briggs,  Berger  Ward,  Mylne,  Thomson,  and  Dr. 
Rushton,  with  Sam  Nicholson  and  his  wife,  nee  Helen  Kane.  I  took 
out  Mrs.  Nicholson,  and  sat  next  her  on  one  side,  while  Dr.  Hawks 
sat  on  the  other.  There  was  a  great  deal  of  pleasant  conversation, 
in  which  I  took  the  side  of  extreme  democracy,  while  every  Amer- 
ican present  took  that  of  conservative  republicanism,  verging  almost 
on  monarchism.  After  dinner  went  to  the  Pelican  Club  with  Mur- 
ray Thomson  and  Heddleston. 

"  May  23.  Harriet  continued  better  to-day.  After  leaving  Mr. 
De  Peyster's  letter  of  introduction  to  Dr.  Hawks  at  the  boarding- 
house  of  the  latter  in  Camp  Street,  where  I  called,  with  Andrew 
Foster,  Jr.,  and  dining  at  the  St.  Louis  Hotel,  a  quarter  before  three, 
I  sent  off  my  baggage  in  a  dray.  It  consisted  of  six  carpetbags,  two 
portmanteaus,  two  boxes,  one  tin  case,  and  the  medicine  chest,  or 

46 


RETURN  JOURNEY   TO   NEW   YORK   WITH   MY   FAMILY.     47 

twelve  packages  in  all.  I  then  sent  off  one  coachful  of  people, 
consisting  of  two  nurses,  J.  Walter,  Helen,  Willie,  and  Harriet,  and 
on  the  return  of  the  coach  from  the  steamer  I  carried  Harriet  in  my 
arms  from  our  bedroom  along  the  lobby  and  down  two  flights  of 
stairs,  and  then  across  the  hall  to  the  carriage,  and  got  her  into  it 
with  Charlotte  and  Bessie.  The  motion  of  the  carriage  did  her 
no  harm.  On  arrival  at  the  wharf  where  the  steamer  Sultana  was 
lying,  I  carried  Harriet  in  my  arms  across  the  wharf  and  through 
the  crowd  up  the  steamboat  stairs,  through  the  long  range  of 
the  gentlemen's  cabin,  and  safely  deposited  her  in  the  lower  berth 
of  stateroom  '  G.'  Murray  T.,  Mylne,  Nicholson,  Holmes,  Mills, 
Mason,  Prehn,  etc.,  were  down  to  see  us  off.  Murray  T.  and  Mylne 
very  kind  and  friendly.  Both  saw  Harriet  in  her  berth.  Murray 
kissed  her,  and  Mylne  kissed  all  the  children,  a  wonderful  effort  for 
him,  with  his  old  bachelor  ways.  Poor  John  Walter  had  been  ill  all 
day  with  a  violent  sick  headache,  and  I  had  to  pack  his  portmanteau 
for  him  I  found  he  had  done  it  so  villainously  ill,  messing  everything 
higgledy-piggledy,  without  any  sort  of  order.  What  with  the  heat, 
and  the  hurry-scurry,  my  frail  temper  was  several  times  pretty  nearly 
giving  way,  but  I  believe  it  did  not.  The  evening  was  beautiful, 
and  the  sail  up  the  Mississippi  was  delightful.  Harriet  felt  so  much 
revived  that  she  sat  on  a  chair  on  the  guard  to  inhale  the  balmy 
breeze.  We  both  felt  thankful  to  God  for  all  his  mercies  toward  us 
in  sparing  us  undiminished  in  numbers  to  leave  New  Orleans,  instead 
of  leaving  some  of  us  to  have  our  bones  picked  by  the  crawfish. 
By  the  way,  on  22d  inst.,  I  saw  in  St.  Louis  Street  a  very  singular 
animal  of  the  turtle  species.  It  seemed  one  of  the  marine  sort  ;  an 
old  sailor  had  a  rope  round  its  neck,  but  there  was  such  a  crowd 
round  him  that  I  could  not  get  an  opportunity  to  ask  him  where  he 
found  it.  It  was  perhaps  three  and  half  feet  long  from  snout  to  the 
tip  of  the  tail,  and  the  carapace  might  be  from  one  and  a  half  to  two 
feet  long,  and  a  little  less  in  breadth  ;  it  had  high  protuberances  on 
the  back,  and  from  the  opposite  side  of  the  street  I  took  it  for  a 
young  alligator,  from  the  knobs.  Its  tail  and  head  were  like  an  alli- 
gator's, and  it  had  long,  sharp  tusks,  and  bit  most  viciously  at  any- 
thing that  came  near  its  mouth  ;  it  had  claws  like  an  alligator,  and 
so  I  suspect,  as  it  had  not  fins,  it  must  have  been  a  sort  of  tortoise. 
Its  back  was  covered  with  a  blackish  looking  sea  weed  or  moss. 


48  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

"  May  24.  We  slept  very  ill  last  night,  being  horribly  annoyed  by 
mosquitoes.  I  rose  about  half  past  five  and  Harriet  about  half  past 
six,  and  she  was  well  enough  to  take  her  seat  at  breakfast.  She  and 
I,  with  John  Walter,  Charlotte,  Bessie,  and  Harriet  all  sit  together, 
near  the  head  of  the  table.  Willie  and  Helen  take  their  meals  with 
the  servants  at  the  second  table. 

"  At  breakfast  to-day  the  negro  chambermaid  told  our  India7i, 
Sarah,  that  she  must  take  her  meals  at  the  third  table  with  the 
blacks,  which  indignity  caused  poor  Sarah  to  lift  up  her  voice  and 
weep,  whereupon  I  went  to  the  clerk  of  the  boat,  who  is  ex-officio 
lord  high  chamberlain,  and  represented  to  him  that  Sarah  was  a 
pure  Indian^  without  the  taint  of  a  drop  of  negro  blood,  and  there- 
fore entitled  to  take  her  meals  with  the  whites.  He  asked  if  the 
white  servants  objected.  I  said  no,  and  he  replied  that  he  would 
see  the  matter  put  to  rights.  As  Sarah  is  pretty  dark,  I  suppose  the 
negresses  wished  to  drag  her  down  to  their  own  level,  but  it  is  well 
understood  that  Indians  are  quite  on  a  par  with  whites.  I  dined 
daily  with  three  or  four  of  them  in  the  Lucy  Long  on  the  Arkansas 
river.  The  least  drop  of  African  blood,  on  the  other  hand,  prevents 
its  possessor  from  sitting  down  with  whites,  except  at  the  communion 
table.  At  least  Dr.  Scott  told  me  negroes,  to  the  number  of 
forty-five,  some  of  them  slaves,  sit  down  to  the  Lord's  Supper 
in  his  church  along  with  the  whites.  Harriet  and  all  the  chil- 
dren and  the  two  nurses  sat  in  the  front  of  the  boat  enjoying  the 
breeze  for  more  than  an  hour  ;  it  is  not  customary  for  ladies  to 
go  there  at  all,  but  it  is  by  far  the  pleasantest,  although  the  most 
dangerous,  part  of  the  boat,  owing  to  its  being  nearly  over  the  boiler. 
It  is  curious  how  one  gets  accustomed  to  dangers.  On  my  first  voy- 
age from  New  Orleans  to  Natchez,  which  was  my  first  experience  of 
a  high-pressure  engine,  I  was  quite  nervous  about  the  boilers 
exploding  ;  but  on  this  Sultana,  with  my  wife  and  children  on  board, 
soon  after  we  left  New  Orleans  we  began  racing  with  another 
steamer,  and  there  was  I  standing  near  the  furnace  and  helping  to 
throw  in  rosin  to  increase  the  heat  and  raise  our  steam  so  as  to 
beat  the  other  boat,  without  a  thought  of  the  danger  to  me  and 
mine.  Although  I  had  a  good  deal  of  mental  misery  in  New 
Orleans,  yet  I  have  had  excellent  health,  and  on  the  whole  it  leaves 
rather  a  pleasant  impression  on  my  mind. 


RETURN   JOURNEY   TO   NEW   YORK   WITH    MY   FAMILY.     49 

"Sunday,  May  25,  1845.  Rose  at  half  past  five,  and  after  dress- 
ing went  on  deck,  and  found  we  were  just  passing  the  upper  end 
of  Palmyra  Island,  opposite  the  woodpile  where  Mylne  and  I  lay 
some  four  hours  last  January,  and  were  taken  up  by  this  very  boat, 
the  Sultana,  about  i  a.  m.,  after  having  fired  a  gun  to  bring  her  to. 
Read  '  Bishop  Heber's  Correspondence,'  fourth  volume,  Murray's 
cheap  edition.  Harriet  not  well  and  in  bad  spirits  most  of  the  day. 
Nothing  wonderful  except  a  wonderfully  good  dinner,  of  which  I 
have  kept  the  bill  of  fare.  I  saw  a  snake  about  three  or  four  feet 
long,  swimming  right  in  the  middle  of  the  Mississippi  against  the 
stream,  and  on  the  surface  of  the  water.  Had  some  conversation 
with  a  flatboatman  returning  to  Illinois  after  having  disposed  of  his 
cargo  of  corn  at  Natchez.  It  takes  six  men  two  weeks  to  build  a 
flatboat  after  all  the  lumber,  etc.,  is  ready.  She  is  caulked  with 
oakum  generally  up  to  the  roof.  The  voyage  from  Evansville,  111., 
where  he  lives,  down  to  New  Orleans  is  generally  from  five  to  six 
weeks.  The  flatboat  costs  one  hundred  dollars,  and  sells  when  the 
voyage  is  over  for  ten  or  twenty  dollars,  sometimes  as  low  as  five 
dollars.  This  boatman  came  originally  from  North  Carolina,  is 
intelligent  and  civil,  much  bronzed  with  the  sun  ;  says  they  carry 
whisky,  but  drink  little  of  it.  He  is  going  to  leave  Illinois  for  Wis- 
consin, because  in  the  former  State  they  now  tax  all  a  man's  prop- 
erty, and  he  can't  stand  it.  Both  to-day  and  yesterday  instead  of 
stopping  to  get  wood,  we  got  two  flatboats  filled  with  wood,  made 
fast,  one  on  each  side,  and  proceeded  on  our  way  while  the  wood 
was  being  put  on  board.  This  done,  the  flatboats  with  two  men  in 
each,  were  cast  off  and  allowed  to  float  down  stream  to  their  own 
locality. 

"  May  26,  1845.  I  had  a  good  sleep  last  niglit  ;  no  mosquitoes, 
or  '  muskys,'  as  old  Peggy  Mackie  used  to  call  them,  and  the  night 
so  cool  that  a  blanket  and  quilt  were  quite  comfortable.  I  can't 
help  thinking  that  this  will  prove  a  late  season,  as  none  of  the  cotton- 
fields  looked  as  if  the  cotton  plants  were  a  foot  high.  Now  in  1842 
cotton  was  in  flower  by  May  20. 

"  The  flatboatman  I  spoke  to  yesterday  told  me  they  sold  their 
Indian  corn  at  Natchez  for  four  bits,  equal  to  fifty  cents,  per  barrel 
of  one  bushel  and  three  pecks. 

"Tuesday,  May  27,   1845.     Yesterday  afternoon  Harriet  and  I 


50  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

sat  for  a  long  time  in  the  bow  of  the  steamer  enjoying  the  delicious 
breeze,  as  mild  as  milk.  The  river  scenery  is  extremely  monoto- 
nous. Went  to  bed  at  lo  p.  m.  and  rose  at  5.10  a.  m.  I  feel  a  little 
squeamish  every  morning  ;  Harriet  rather  better  in  general  health. 
Met  Mr.  J.  G.  Yerger  on  deck  this  morning  ;  he  had  come  on  board 
at  Memphis  last  night,  and  is  going  to  Cincinnati.  He  introduced 
me  to  a  Judge  Wilkinson,  who  is  a  slave  owner,  but  opposed  to 
slavery.  He  thinks  time  and  Christianity  will  put  an  end  to  slavery. 
He  advocates  the  propriety  of  admitting  negro  witnesses  against 
white  men  in  cases  of  murder,  and  of  passing  a  law  to  prevent  the 
sale  of  negroes  except  in  families.  He  himself  opposed  the  other 
day  the  sale  of  thirty  negroes  except  in  families  ;  the  owner  wished 
them  to  be  sold  singly,  as  in  that  way  they  would  bring  most  money, 
and  the  sheriff  is  bound  so  to  sell  them  if  the  owner  or  creditor  requires 
it,  but  in  this  case  Judge  Wilkinson  told  the  sheriff  not  to  mind 
what  the  owner  said,  and  ordered  him  to  sell  in  families,  and  made 
a  short  speech  to  the  people  at  the  sale,  expressing  his  opinion  as  to 
the  impropriety  of  selling  them  except  in  families,  and  he  carried  all 
the  people  along  with  him.  Judge  Wilkinson  has  a  woman,  Char- 
lotte, half  white,  whom  he  freed  in  Philadelphia,  but  she  will  not 
leave  the  family,  and  still  resides  Avith  him.  He  and  his  wife 
wanted  her  to  go  into  a  convent,  but  she  said  she  would  not  marry 
at  any  rate,  but  would  not  go  there.  Judge  Wilkinson  and  his  wife 
are  Roman  Catholics,  converted  from  Protestantism.  He  seems  a 
mild,  pleasant,  sensible  man.  Both  he  and  Yerger,  like  most  of  the 
respectabilities,  are  Whigs. 

"  Wednesday,  May  28,  1845.  We  arrived  at  Paducah,  a  well-built 
little  town  with  a  number  of  brick  houses  and  stores,  at  the  mouth 
of  the  Tennessee  River,  at  half  past  four  this  morning,  having 
entered  the  Ohio  River  in  the  night-time.  It  was  so  low  that  the 
Sultana  could  proceed  no  farther,  and  her  passengers  got  into  two 
small  boats,  the  Felix  Grundy  and  the  Wabash  Valley,  the  former 
the  better  and  larger  boat.  I,  unlike  myself,  very  foolishly  trusted 
that  Captain  Pease  of  the  Sultana  would  secure  berths  for  us  on 
board  the  better  boat,  and  did  not  go  to  look  after  them  until  they 
were  all  taken  in  the  Felix  Grundy.  I,  however,  got  three  state- 
rooms in  the  ladies'  cabin  of  the  Wabash  Valley,  and  a  berth  for 
John  Walter,  for  which  I  paid  thirty-five  dollars  to  Louisville,  which 


RETURN  JOURNEY  TO  NEW  YORK  WITH  MY  FAMILY.  5 1 

Captain  Pease  refunded  to  mc.  The  Wabash  Valley  is  about  the 
size  of  the  Lucy  Long,  but  cleaner.  I  am  afraid  we  shall  be  four 
days  in  her  before  we  reach  Louisville,  as  she  goes  very  slowly,  and 
we  have  still  510  miles  to  go.  I  got  the  baggage  and  the  infantry 
wonderfully  well  on  board,  but  poor  Powell  has  left  her  gold  watch 
behind  her  in  the  Sultana.  There  are  no  basins  or  towels,  even  in 
the  ladies'  cabin,  in  the  Wabash  Valley  j  all  have  to  wash  in  a  wash- 
room attached  to  it  and  use  a  jack-towel.  However,  I  have  fee'd  the 
stewardess  to  get  Harriet  a  basin  and  towel. 

*'  Thursday,  May  29,  1845.  Rose  at  4.30  a.  m.,  both  Harriet  and 
I,  and  we  slept  better  than  could  have  been  expected  from  the 
accommodations.  I  did  not  go  to  bed  till  ten  last  night,  and  when 
I  came  to  the  ladies'  cabin  I  found  the  floor  covered  with  women 
asleep  on  matresses,  and  that  it  was  impossible  to  get  through  to  my 
room,  so  I  had  to  get  on  the  paddle-box  and  slide  down  to  the 
guard  in  the  dark,  which  was  anything  but  pleasant  or  safe,  and 
enter  my  stateroom  in  that  way.  We  stopped  yesterday  at  Smith- 
land  for  several  hours  ;  this  is  a  thriving-looking  town  at  the  mouth 
of  the  Cumberland  River.  Here  we  took  on  board  a  great  many 
deck  passengers  for  Pittsburgh,  and  some  of  our  cabin  passengers 
left  us  and  new  ones  came  in  their  places,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Barri^re 
disliked  the  accommodations  so  much  that  they  went  into  the  Felix 
Grundy  at  Smithland,  although  Mrs.  Barriere  would  require  to  sleep 
on  the  floor  of  the  ladies'  cabin.  Clogg  and  Heath  also  left  us  to 
wait  for  another  boat,  as  they  gave  up  their  stateroom  to  two  ladies 
whom  they  knew  in  New  Orleans,  and  these  ladies  afterward  insisted 
on  getting  into  J.  Walter's  stateroom,  thus  compelling  him  to  give 
up  his  berth  and  get  another.  I  positively  refused  to  let  him  do 
this  until  the  captain  got  him  another  berth,  fearing  that  if  I  let  him 
give  up  his  original  berth  he  might  need  to  sleep  on  the  floor  all  the 
voyage,  so  I  made  him  lie  down  in  his  berth  until  another  was  got 
for  him.  The  ladies  are  very  noisy,  loud-talking  damsels,  and  I 
think  one  is  an  Irishwoman,  both  rather  good-looking  and  ladylike, 
however.  One  has  reddish  hair  and  black  eyes,  and  Charlotte  heard 
her  reviling  me  as  the  '  red-whiskered  Englishman.'  Like  Scrub  in 
the  play,  I  heard  them  '  laugh  consumedly,'  when  J,  Walter's  port- 
manteau was  brought  out  with  '  W.  Wood,  Liverpool,'  on  it  in  large 
letters.     A  gentleman  on  board,  when  I  was  refusing  to  give  up  J. 


52  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

Walter's  berth  until  he  was  provided  with  another,  very  officiously 
said  :  '  Oh,  I  will  give  up  my  berth  or  my  whole  stateroom  to  your 
son  if  he  will  give  up  his  to  oblige  the  ladies.'  I  replied  I  only 
wanted  a  berth,  not  an  entire  stateroom,  and  that  I  was  determined 
to  have  in  the  first  place.  So  I  went  to  this  gentleman's  stateroom 
and  got  the  upper  berth  for  John  Walter,  but  all  this  was  mighty 
disagreeable,  and  puts  me  in  a  false  position  with  the  two  ladies, 
who  are  to  be  our  fellow-passengers  for  the  rest  of  the  voyage,  which 
may  be  three  days.  The  captain  afterward  explained  to  me  that  he 
had  promised  a  stateroom  to  these  two  ladies,  but,  before  they  got 
on  board,  the  clerk,  not  knowing  this,  had  given  it  to  two  other 
ladies,  and  as  the  F.  Grundy  had  left  by  this  time,  these  two  ladies 
and  the  old  gentleman  who  was  with  them  must  have  waited  at 
Smithland  had  they  not  got  on  board  the  Wabash  Valley.  They  are 
from  New  Orleans. 

"  The  scenery  of  the  Ohio,  particularly  on  the  Illinois  shore,  is 
very  pretty,  with  fine  rocky  cliffs  rising  in  some  places  two  or  three 
hundred  feet  high,  the  strata  of  the  rocks  horizontal.  This  scenery 
is  extremely  like  that  of  the  Arkansas  River  above  Little  Rock,  but 
the  Ohio  scenery  is,  in  my  opinion,  not  nearly  so  fine,  and  wants  the 
picturesque  mountains  or  hills  of  Arkansas.  Here,  as  on  the  Arkan- 
sas, the  cliff  scenery  is  in  some  measure  spoiled  by  the  large  trees 
growing  from  the  brink  of  the  river  to  the  base  of  the  cliffs,  which 
take  from  the  grandeur  of  the  latter. 

"  There  is  a  beautiful  boy  on  board,  the  son  of  a  flatboatman,  and 
born  in  Indiana  ;  beautiful  flaxen,  curly  hair,  and  blue  eyes,  only 
three  years  old  last  January,  and  yet  is  once  and  a  half  as  tall  and  as 
broad  as  Willie.  He  is  his  mother's  eighteenth  child,  the  father  told 
me,  of  which  number  sixteen  are  sons  ;  of  the  whole  eight  sons  and 
two  daughters  still  live.  The  father  is  a  slim,  bronzed  man,  not  over 
forty,  I  should  think. 

"Friday,  May  30,  1845.  Landed  with  J.  Walter  yesterday  at 
Evansville,  Indiana,  just  to  say  we  had  been  in  that  State.  Evans- 
ville  seems  to  be  a  thriving  place,  with  many  brick  houses.  Here 
boys  came  on  board  with  books  and  newspapers  to  sell,  gingerbread, 
apples,  pies,  etc.  The  scenery  all  day  very  monotonous,  like  the 
Mississippi,  without  high  bluffs. 

"  This  day  (May  30,  1845)  at  dinner  occurred  a  most  disagreeable 


RETURN   JOURNEY   TO   NEW   YORK   WITH    MY   FAMILY.     53 

scuffle  between  a  Judge  McKinley  and  myself.  I  placed  Bessie 
third  from  the  top  of  the  table,  which  I  believed  was  her  seat,  and 
where  I  am  very  sure  she  sat  at  breakfast  time.  He  turned  round 
to  me,  and  in  an  insolent  tone  of  voice  asked  if  he  was  to  be  put  out 
of  his  seat.  I  said  it  was  not  his  seat  but  my  little  daughter's,  who 
had  sat  there  at  breakfast.  This  he  denied  and  I  asserted,  but 
moved  her  down.  However,  he  still  kept  asserting  the  place  was 
his,  which  I  as  stoutly  denied,  whereupon  he  takes  his  tumbler  and 
shies  it  at  my  head,  but  it  fortunately  missed  me,  and  I,  of  course, 
struck  at  him,  and  hit  him,  I  believe,  under  the  left  eye,  as  his  face 
was  cut  a  little  and  his  spectacle  glass  broken.  All  the  ladies  were 
screaming,  and  the  men  separated  us.  I  sat  down  to  dinner  and  the 
judge  retired  to  his  room  to  repair  damages.  The  ladies  were  in  a 
great  '  to  do,'  and  after  dinner  I  went  to  Judge  McKinley's  room  for 
the  purpose  of  explaining  calmly  to  him  that  he  was  wrong,  as  one 
of  his  ladies  was  absent  at  breakfast,  but  I  was  held  back  by  some 
gentlemen,  who  thought  that  I  was  going  to  renew  the  fight.  How- 
ever, I  told  them  I  would  not,  and  opened  his  door,  but  he  cried 
out  :  '  I  don't  know  but  you  are  armed,'  and  would  not  let  the  door 
be  shut,  although  I  told  him  I  was  not,  and  threw  open  my  coat  to 
show  him  that  I  had  no  weapons.  However,  he  would  hear  nothing, 
unless  I  intended  to  make  him  an  apology,  which  I  declined  doing, 
as  I  thought  it  was  he  who  was  in  the  wrong,  and  owed  me  one,  more 
than  I  owed  him.  I  said,  when  he  talked  about  my  being  armed,  that 
I  would  do  nothing  further  at  present  than  I  had  done,  as  I  had  my 
wife  and  six  children  to  take  care  of.  He  said  he  was  on  the  bench 
and  could  do  nothing,  but  if  not  he  7vould  (I  suspect  he  was  a 
coward  as  well  as  a  bully),  as  he  would  knock  any  man  down  who 
gave  him  the  lie,  as  I  had  done.  Now,  I  never  used  the  word  '  lie  ' 
or  'liar,'  but  simply  asserted  that  Bessie  had  a  certain  seat, which  he 
denied. 

"  This  has  been  a  most  disagreeable  business,  and  I  fear  that  the 
motto  on  the  outside  of  this  book,  '  Forsan  et  hcec  olim  meminisse 
juvabit,'  will  never  apply  to  //.  The  tumbler  intended  for  my  head 
in  its  descent  struck  my  dear  little  Charlotte  on  the  arm  and  bruised, 
but  did  not  break,  the  skin.  If  it  had  hit  her  head  or  mine  it  might 
have  killed  us,  so  true  it  is,  as  the  Episcopal  prayerbook's  funeral 
service  says,  that  *  in  the  midst  of  life  we  are  in  death.'    How  strange 


54  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

that  a  peaceable  man  like  myself  should  be  involved  in  such  a  quar- 
rel !  I  will  not  give  way  to  superstition  ;  still,  I  confess  I  would  not 
like  to  begin  another  journey  on  a  Friday  !  Judge  McKinley  seems 
to  be  about  fifty-five  or  fifty-six,  and  is  judge  of  the  United  States 
Circuit  Court  for  Kentucky  and  some  adjacent  States,  and  I  am  told 
was  appointed  by  Van  Buren.  I  find  that  the  name  of  one  of  the 
ladies  traveling  with  him  is  Randolph.  I  learned  subsequently  that 
the  captain  of  the  boat,  who  '  curred,'  not  to  '  the  provost '  but  to 
the  judge,  had  wanted  to  set  me  ashore  in  the  woods,  but  the  stew- 
ard, who  was  a  Scotsman,  threatened  if  he  dared  to  lay  a  hand  on 
me  he  would  set  him  (the  captain)  ashore,  and  there  was  very  nearly 
a  mutiny  on  board.  This  day  (May  30)  has  been  clear  and  bright 
and  very  cold,  so  that  I  had  to  put  on  my  greatcoat.  It  is  the  cold- 
est weather  we  have  had  since  we  left  New  York  last  December. 
Judge  McKinley  and  I  walking  up  and  down  the  upper  deck,  and  I, 
and  I  dare  say  he,  thinking  every  minute  that  the  other  might 
attempt  to  throw  his  adversary  into  the  Ohio  ! 

"Louisville,  Saturday,  May  31,  1845.  Arrived  about  12.30  a.  m. 
(/.  <?.,  midnight).  Got  two  coaches  at  the  canal  to  convey  us  to  town, 
which  was  two  miles  distant.  Got  all  the  children  and  baggage 
loaded  with  some  difficulty,  and  the  baggage  and  coach  being  on  one 
side  of  the  canal,  we  had,  in  the  dark,  to  cross  the  top  of  a  very  high 
canal  lock,  with  a  narrow  footway,  and  only  a  hand-rail  on  one  side. 
One  of  the  lock-keepers  very  kindly  carried  Harriet  and  Helen  across 
in  his  arms.  When  we  climbed  up  the  high  bank  on  the  opposite 
side  we  found  that  one  of  our  coaches  had  been  occupied  by  other 
people,  so  we  and  all  our  baggage  had  to  get  crammed  into  one 
coach.  Just  before  we  started  for  the  hotel  in  Louisville  I  found 
that  Judge  McKinley  and  his  party  had  got  into  our  other  coach. 
However,  I  said  nothing,  as  I  had  not  engaged  the  coachman  by 
giving  him  my  name,  and  my  own  coachman  said  that  McKinley's 
party  had  engaged  //,  which  it  is  possible  they  had  before  I  did,  as  I 
heard  McKinley  shouting  out  to  a  coachman  at  the  first  lock  and  I 
did  not  get  out  till  the  secofid. 

We  secured  four  very  comfortable  rooms  in  the  Louisville  Hotel, 
kept  by  Mr.  Bishop,  formerly  of  New  Orleans,  and  who  married  a 
Miss  Fletcher  of  Manchester.  The  arrangement  of  our  dormi- 
tories is  : 


RETURN  JOURNEY  TO  NEW  YORK  WITH  MY  FAMILY.   55 

"  Harriet,  Bessie,  and  I. 

"  John  Walter  and  Willie. 

"  Charlotte,  little  Harriet,  and  Sarah. 

"  Powell  and  Helen. 

"  After  a  most  comfortable  breakfast  we  started  in  the  mail 
steamer  Ben.  Franklin  for  Cincinnati,  and  had  a  delightful  day's  sail 
up  the  Ohio  amid  beautiful  scenery,  the  banks  on  each  side  being 
generally  a  succession  of  knolls  or  small  hills  covered  with  fine  trees. 
Everywhere  lovely  situations  for  villas  and  some  very  pretty  houses  and 
towns  on  the  banks.    Harriet  better  to-day  and  enjoyed  the  scenery. 

"  I  had  some  talk  to-day  with  a  stout,  good-humored  looking  fellow 
who  had  been  on  board  the  Wabash  Valley  with  us,  and  who  proves 
to  be  the  editor  of  the  Cincinnati  Gazette,  Whig  newspaper.  He  said 
Judge  McKinley's  conduct  was  most  disgraceful  ;  and  he  had 
frightened  him  (McKinley)  by  telling  him  that  there  was  a  gentleman 
on  board  connected  with  the  press,  who  was  in  possession  of  all  the 
facts  of  the  case,  and  would  probably  publish  them.  He  (the  said 
editor)  said  he  admired  my  conduct  in  going  to  the  judge's  room 
after  the  affray  to  try  and  come  to  an  explanation,  and  also 
when  the  judge  would  not  hear  anything  unless  I  made  an  apology 
for  giving  him  the  lie,  he  said  I  did  right  in  saying  I  would  make 
no  apology. 

"Sunday,  June  i,  1845.  Arrived  at  Cincinnati  at  4.30  a.  m., 
dressed  and  got  two  carriages  to  take  us  and  our  baggage  to  the 
Broadway  House,  to  which  I  had  first  gone  myself  and  engaged 
rooms.  The  Wabash  Valley  arrived  about  the  same  time,  and  I 
sent  John  Walter  to  get  the  air  cushion,  which  he  did.  The  two 
ladies,  Mrs.  Randolph,  etc.,  who  were  under  Judge  McKinley's  care, 
have  just  arrived  here,  which  is  disagreeable.  Mr.  Rodewald's  party 
also  have  just  come,  delighted  to  see  our  children,  and  have  again 
departed  on  their  journey.  The  Barrieres  and  a  French  party  are 
off  in  an  *  extra  '  for  Wheeling. 

"  Went  to  an  Episcopal  church  to-day,  and  heard  a  very  good 
sermon  from  the  text  '  Be  ye  followers  of  me,  even  as  I  also  am 
of  Christ.'  Went  in  the  evening  to  the  Second  Presbyterian 
Church,  and  heard  a  Dr.  Allen  of  Philadelphia  preach.  The  sermon 
was  witty  and  interesting,  and  the  doctrine  good.  The  church  was 
a  neat,  large,  handsome  building. 


56  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

"  June  2.  Rose  at  six,  chartered  a  carnage  and  pair  and  drove 
with  Harriet,  John  Walter,  Charlotte,  Bessie,  and  little  Harriet, 
to  the  top  of  Mount  Auburn,  from  which  we  had  a  beautiful 
view  of  the  town  and  country,  then  drove  through  the  town,  for 
the  charge  of  two  dollars.  Had  very  fine  Alpine  strawberries  at 
dinner.  I  have  a  great  notion  that  the  two  French  ladies  whom  we 
saw  with  Judge  McKinley  want  to  get  into  our  '  extra.' 

"Tuesday,  June  3,  1845.  The  three  girls  too  late  for  breakfast 
to-day.  There  was  an  immense  number  of  new  arrivals  this  morn- 
ing, most  of  them  ladies.  Wrote  a  letter  to  the  postmaster,  telling 
him  to  forward  any  letters  addressed  to  Harriet  or  me  to  the  care  of 
Dennistoun  &  Co.,  67  Wall  Street,  New  York. 

"  John  Walter  and  I  crossed  over  the  ferry  to  Newport  last 
afternoon,  walked  down  to  the  Licking  River,  and  were  ferried 
across  in  a  scow  to  Covington,  and  from  thence  crossed  the  Ohio  by 
another  steam  ferry  to  Cincinnati.  The  appearance  of  Cincinnati  is 
injured  by  the  number  of  trees  cut  down  on  Mount  Adams  and 
Mount  Auburn,  thus  exposing  the  bare  yellow  earth,  as  no  grass  has 
yet  grown. 

"  We  left  Cincinnati  after  an  early  dinner  at  i  p.  m.,  having  paid 
$130  in  gold  for  an  'exclusive  extra'  with  four  horses  to  Cleve- 
land ;  the  distance  is  250  miles.  In  the  twenty-eight  miles  to 
Lebanon  we  changed  three  times  and  had  excellent  teams  of  horses. 
One  of  our  drivers  told  me  such  horses  averaged  $50  each,  and  some 
were  raised  in  Ohio,  and  others  in  Tennessee  and  Kentucky.  The 
Tennessee  horses  are  the  best  of  the  three  breeds  for  the  road.  The 
horses  are  fed  on  oats,  Indian  corn,  and  hay,  and  are  in  excellent 
condition.  The  wheat  crop  is  well  in  the  ear,  but  is  thin  on  the 
ground.  Indian  corn  very  backward,  and  all  crops  suffering  from 
drought.  We  passed  through  a  beautiful  rolling  country,  very 
thickly  peopled  for  a  new  country,  and  stopped  for  the  night  at  the 
Williamson  House  in  Lebanon,  a  poorish  country  inn. 

"Wednesday,  June  4,  1845.  Rose  at  3.30  a.  m.  after  lying  awake 
all  night,  as  did  Harriet.  We  got  some  bread  and  milk  for  the 
children  at  Lebanon,  having  paid  $5  for  our  board  and  beds,  and 
fifty  cents  to  the  waiter  or  factotum.  We  started  at  twenty  minutes 
past  four  and  saw  the  sun  rise  after  we  set  out.  We  drove  twenty- 
four  miles  and  then  breakfasted  at  Xenia  very  comfortably  for  $3, 


RETURN   JOURNEY   TO   NEW   YORK   WITH    MY   FAMILY.     57 

and  had  waffles,  etc.  Here  I  bought  d'Aubigne's  '  History  of  the 
Reformation  '  from  a  peddler  who  had  a  collection  of  standard  works 
for  sale  in  the  barroom.  It  rained  heavily  till  after  we  had  passed 
Xenia  some  miles,  and  then  it  grew  hot  and  dusty.  We  stopped  to 
dine  at  2  p.  m.  at  London,  a  small  village  of  twenty  or  thirty  inhab- 
itants. We  got  a  very  good  dinner  and  paid  only  $2.25.  We  started 
again  a  little  after  3,  and  reached  Columbus  a  little  after  7  p.  m., 
and  drove  to  the  Neil  House,  an  immense  hotel,  built  of  brick,  and 
apparently  as  large  as  either  the  Astor  in  New  York,  or  the  St. 
Charles  iii  New  Orleans  ;  but,  being  a  large  square  pile  of  brick, 
resembles  more  the  New  York  Hotel  of  New  York.  We  sat  down  to 
a  capital  supper  :  beefsteak,  broiled  chickens,  honeycomb,  tea,  coffee, 
and  various  sorts  of  bread,  excellent  butter,  and  plenty  of  ice,  both  to 
water  and  milk  and  on  butter.  I  went  to  the  stage  office,  and 
arranged  to  start  to-morrow  morning  at  half  past  eight  en  route  for 
Cleveland.  The  stage  agent  is  a  gentlemanly,  civil  young  man. 
Columbus  is  really  a  handsome  town  and  has  a  beautiful  penitentiary. 
It  is  de  jure  the  metropolis  of  Ohio.  To-day  we  passed  through 
beautiful  rolling  country.  When  approaching  Columbus  we  passed 
over  an  alluvial  plain  of  a  mile  and  a  half  wide,  and  then  crossed 
the  Scioto  by  a  handsome  wooden  bridge.  Columbus  stands  on  the 
right  bank  of  the  Scioto  on  a  high  bank.  The  woodwork  of  the 
Neil  House  is  all  black  walnut. 

"Thursday,  June  5.  Left  Columbus  this  morning  at  half  past 
eight,  and  before  leaving  took  a  walk  through  the  town.  We  had 
an  excellent  coach  and  beautiful  horses.  On  the  way  out  of  the 
town  we  passed  the  lunatic  asylum,  blind  asylum,  and  deaf  and 
dumb  asylum.  All  fine  large  buildings,  the  first  particularly  so  ;  it 
was  built  by  convict  labor.  I  saw  some  of  the  convicts,  in  their 
prison  dresses,  building  a  new  wing.  We  dined  at  Sunbury,  twenty- 
three  miles  from  Columbus  and  paid  S^-So  for  our  dinners.  The 
charge  at  the  Neil  House  for  supper,  beds,  and  breakfast,  was  $8. 
We  arrived  at  Mount  Vernon,  forty-seven  miles  from  Columbus,  at 
6.45  p.  M.  It  is  a  most  thriving  little  town  of  some  three  thousand 
inhabitants.  It  is  supplied  with  dry  goods  from  New  York,  and 
receives  its  European  news  from  Buffalo,  its  sugar  from  New  Orleans 
via  Cincinnati.  Our  hotel  is  the  Kenyon  House,  very  neat  and 
comfortable.     The  road  passed  over  to-day  was  very  rough,  being 


58  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

only  a  natural  mud  road.  We  forded  several  small  streams,  all  being 
nearly  dry  from  the  drought.  The  wheat  appeared  to  be  much 
injured  by  the  frost,  and  the  leaves  of  the  ash  trees  quite  withered. 
The  landlord  tells  me  that  the  farmers  hardly  expect  any  harvest. 
There  is  a  very  handsome  Episcopal  church  here,  and  also  several 
other  churches. 

"  Friday,  June  6.  Rose  at  half  past  five  and  breakfasted  at  seven. 
Our  bill  at  Mount  Vernon  for  suppers,  beds,  and  breakfasts,  S7-50- 
We  set  off  at  7.30  a.  m.,  and  dined  at  Londonville,  twenty-three 
miles  from  Mount  Vernon.  Dinner  good  and  cost  5^2.50.  Arrived 
at  Wooster  at  6.30  p.  m.  where  we  found  a  small  but  comfortable 
hotel,  not  the  best  in  the  place  ;  got  supper  at  7.30  p.  m.  The 
country  we  passed  through  to-day  was  very  /lilly,  with  whole  miles  of 
forest  as  brown  and  bare  as  if  it  were  winter,  owing  to  the  recent 
frost.  Wheat  and  Indian  corn  much  injured  by  the  frost  and  long 
drought.  Some  thunder  to-day  and  a  light  sprinkle  of  rain,  barely 
enough  to  lay  the  dust.  Our  second  stage  we  were  driven  by 
an  Englishman  from  Kent,  who  came  out  here  when  nineteen 
years  old,  and  has  been  here  eighteen  years,  and  driven  stage  for 
fourteen  years,  has  a  younger  brother  who  was  employed  as  a 
mason  in  building  Kenyon  College  near  Mount  Vernon,  then  began 
to  study  in  that  college,  finally  graduated,  and  is  now  an  Episcopal 
minister  in  Tennessee.  Kenyon  College  was  got  up  by  Bishop 
Chace,  and  is  called  Kenyon  from  the  large  subscription  of  Lord 
Kenyon,  and  the  village  near  it,  Gambier,  from  Lord  Gambier's  sub- 
scription. It  is  Episcopal  and  built  in  the  Gothic  style.  The  hotel 
at  Mount  Vernon  is  called  Kenyon  House.  A  gentleman  here 
recommends  the  Franklin  Hotel  at  Cleveland,  the  American  at 
Buffalo,  and  the  Clifton  House  at  Niagara  Falls. 

"  Saturday,  June  7,  1845.  Left  Wooster  at  6.30  a.  m.,  after  a  good 
breakfast.  Our  bill  was  $6.50.  We  took  the  stage  agent  along 
with  us,  a  Mr.  Mason  from  Stirling,  and  a  pleasant  man.  We  dined 
at  Strongsville,  a  very  small  town.  The  charge  was  $2.  Arrived 
at  Cleveland  at  5  p.  m.  No  steamer  for  Buffalo  until  to-morrow. 
We  put  up  at  the  Franklin  House,  an  excellent  hotel,  just  opened. 
Had  splendid  strawberries  at  tea,  and  nice  milk  with  ice,  and,  by 
the  way,  we  had  beautiful  ice  all  through  Ohio.  John  Walter  and  I 
walked  about   the   town,  and   by  the  lake,  which  murmured  like  the 


RETURN  JOURNEY  TO  NEW  YORK  WITH  MY  FAMILY.  59 

sea.  Poor  Harriet  suffering  and  ill.  J.  W.  and  I  went  to  a  negro 
barber's,  and  had  our  heads  thoroughly  washed  at  twenty-five  cents 
for  both.  Cleveland  is  a  fine,  thriving,  handsome  town  of  six  or 
seven  thousand  inhabitants,  two  daily  newspapers,  a  directory,  and 
also  cabs  and  omnibuses. 

"  Neil,  Moore  &  Co.  have  six  thousand  horses,  fifteen  hundred 
drivers,  and  twenty-five  agents  in  their  coaching  establishment.  My 
authority  is  Mr.  Mason,  the  Scotsman  I  referred  to,  from  Stirling, 
and  he  is  their  agent  between  Wooster  and  Cleveland. 

"Sunday,  June  8,  1845.  Having  some  scruples  of  conscience 
about  setting  out  on  a  journey  on  Sunday,  I  determined  to  stay  in 
Cleveland  all  day,  and  leave  for  Buffalo  to-morrow.  The  weather 
has  been  excessively  hot.  Went  to  the  First  Presbyterian  Church, 
and  heard  a  poor  and  long  sermon  from  a  stranger. 

"Monday,  June  9,  1845.  Left  Cleveland  per  Chesapeake 
steamer  at  8.30  a.  m.,  a  fine  day,  with  a  little  swell  on  Lake  Erie, 
the  water  of  a  green  color.  Passed  the  town  of  Erie  at  5  p.  m.; 
prettily  situated  on  a  high  bank,  with  an  arm  of  land  stretching 
out  into  the  lake  in  front  of  it,  and  forming  a  fine  natural  harbor. 
The  ground  rises  gradually  behind  the  town  to  a  considerable  height. 
This  part  of  the  coast  of  Lake  Erie  puts  me  in  mind  of  the  Ayrshire 
coast  about  Fairlie  and  Ivelburn.  Harriet  very  feeble  and  dispirited 
to-day.  A  beautiful  sunset.  John  Walter  talking  to  some  young 
ladies  all  day.  The  bill  at  the  Franklin  House  was  $20,  and  the 
fare  in  the  Chesapeake  from  Cleveland  to  Buffalo,  $27.50.  I  fear 
much  I  shall  fall  short  of  cash  before  I  reach  Saratoga. 

Tuesday,  June  10,  1845.  Arrived  at  Buffalo  about  3  a.  m.;  rose 
at  5,  dressed,  and  went  ashore,  and  arranged  with  the  baggage  wagon 
and  omnibus  of  the  American  Hotel  to  come  to  the  Chesapeake  for 
us  as  soon  as  Harriet  and  the  infantry  were  dressed.  All  the  hotels 
seem  to  have  coaches  or  omnibuses  attached  to  them,  which  take  you 
to  and  from  the  hotel  gratis.  Arrived  at  the  American  about  6.30 
A.  M.,  and  got  excellent,  large,  comfortable  bedrooms  secured  ;  then 
breakfasted  in  the  public  room,  and  at  8.30  a.  m.  drove  down  to  the 
Ef7ierald  steamer,  which  started  at  nine  for  Chippewa,  two  miles  above 
the  Falls  of  Niagara  on  the  Canadian  side.  There  was  a  large 
number  of  respectable  tourists  on  board,  and  the  day  was  lovely, 
with  a  fine  breeze.     Three  harpers  and  a  fiddler  played  all  the  way 


6o  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

down  the  Niagara  River.  We  got  into  the  railway  car  at  Chippewa, 
drawn  by  horses,  and  shortly  came  in  sight  of  the  rapids,  and  then 
of  the  Falls,  Last  time  I  saw  them  Harriet  and  I  were  just  married, 
and  now  we  returned  to  them  with  six  children,  the  eldest  fourteen 
next  October  !  We  alighted  half  a  mile  from  the  Clifton  House, 
walked  there,  and  then  got  into  a  nice  open  carriage,  which  took  us  all 
to  the  Burning  Spring,  about  a  mile  above  the  Falls.  This  spring  is 
well  worth  seeing ;  it  bubbles  up  close  to  the  rapids,  and  on  a 
match  being  applied,  an  immense  flame  plays  over  the  surface  of  the 
water,  giving  out  much  heat,  and  the  flame  does  not  cease  until 
blown  out.  The  gas  evolved  is,  I  suppose,  sulphureted  hydrogen. 
We  then  drove,  by  a  road  opened  since  we  were  there,  to  Table  Rock, 
and  looked  at  the  Falls  from  that  point.  Then  John  Walter,  Char- 
lotte, Bessie,  and  I  descended  the  stairs,  and  viewed  the  Falls  from 
below.  J.  Walter  and  I  went  forward  to  below  a  small  portion  of 
the  shoot.  We  then  ascended  the  stairs,  and  drove  to  the  Clifton 
House  ;  got  lunch,  and  paid  ^2.25  for  it,  and  $1.50  for  the  coach. 
We  then  walked  down  the  cliff  road  to  the  ferry.  This  road  is  very 
picturesque,  and  so  also  is  the  crossing  of  the  ferry.  Charlotte, 
Bessie,  and  Harriet  wept  bitterly  from  fear  when  crossing.  Helen 
smiled  and  crowed,  not  having  sense  enough  to  be  frightened.  Willie 
did  not  much  like  it.  We  were  then  safely  landed  on  the  American 
side,  and  ascended  a  long  flight  of  wooden  stairs,  I  carrying  Helen 
in  my  arms,  and  J.  Walter,  Willie,  on  his  back.  This  done,  we 
walked  to  the  railway  station,  where  leaving  the  rest,  John  Walter, 
Charlotte,  and  I  ran  across  the  bridge  to  Goat  Island,  and  across 
the  island  itself,  and  out  on  the  platform  projecting  over  the  rapids 
of  the  British  Falls.  We  then  ascended  the  tower,  there  erected, 
and  had  a  splendid  view  of  the  Falls  and  rapids,  above  and  below, 
and  then  ran  back  to  the  railway,  and  did  the  whole  visit  to  Goat 
Island,  to  and  from  the  railway — John  Walter  and  I  ascending  the 
tower  twice,  as  Charlotte  did  not  go  up  the  first  time — in  twenty-five 
minutes.  Poor  Charlotte  nearly  '  bust  the  biler,'  and  John  Walter 
and  I  were  like  the  ladies  of  quality  in  the  immortal  '  Vicar,' 
We  started  for  Buffalo  in  an  excellent  railway  car  at  2.30  p.  m., 
and  arrived  about  4.  The  hotel  omnibus  was  waiting  for  us, 
and  drove  us  to  the  hotel.  Trip  in  steamer  down,  $5,  which  was 
also  the  charge  up  in  the  railway  ;  lunch  at  Clifton  House,  $2.25  ; 


RETURN   JOURNEY   TO   NEW   YORK   WITH    MY   FAMILY,     6l 

coach,  $1.50  ;  ferriage  across  below  the  Falls,  84  cents.  Spent  a 
charming  day,  and  I  was  particularly  delighted  that  I  had  shown 
all  the  children  so  much  in  so  short  a  time,  but  if  my  money  had 
not  run  out,  so  as  to  leave  me  barely  enough  to  reach  Saratoga,  I 
should  have  spent  a  day  at  the  Falls,  and  would  like  to  spend  a  week 
or  two.  The  Falls  have  almost  become  Cockneyfied  since  I  was 
there  before,  but  are  as  magnificent  as  ever  ;  but,  perhaps  the  facility 
of  reaching  them,  and  the  beautiful  and  comfortable  hotels  at  them, 
take  away  the  mysterious  awe  one  felt  when  the  surrounding 
scenery  was  more  in  a  state  of  nature,  although  I  think  the  hotels 
and  villas  really  improve  the  scenery,  which  struck  me  as  highly 
beautiful.     Dear  Harriet  stood  the  jaunt  very  well. 

**  Wednesday,  June  1 1,  1845.  Bill  at  the  American  House,  Buffalo, 
twelve  dollars.  Breakfasted  and  got  ourselves  and  our  baggage 
taken  to  the  railway  station  for  nothing,  but  gave  the  two  porters 
fifty  cents  between  them,  with  which  they  seemed  perfectly  satis- 
fied. We  dined  at  Rochester  at  2  p.  m.,  and  had  a  very  hurry- 
skurry  dinner,  having  to  walk  one-quarter  of  a  mile  to  the  Amer- 
ican Hotel,  besides  having  to  select  and  see  stowed  into  another 
car  all  our  baggage.  The  country  looked  beautiful  and  highly  cul- 
tivated, much  more  so  than  when  dear  Harriet  and  I  passed  through 
it  on  our  marriage  Jaunt  fifteen  years  ago.  In  the  afternoon  we 
passed  Canandaigua,  Geneva,  and  Auburn.  Canandaigua,  Seneca, 
and  Cayuga  I^akes  looked  beautiful.  The  railway  crosses  the  last 
by  a  bridge  a  mile  long.  We  took  a  sort  of  Passover  supper  (our 
loins  girt  and  our  staffs  in  our  hands)  at  Geneva,  for  which  I  paid 
only  fifty  cents.  The  moon  was  in  her  first  quarter  and  the 
night  beautiful.  We  arrived  at  Syracuse  about  11.30?.  m.  Here 
I  had  another  bother  with  the  baggage,  and  then  to  get  beds  for 
us  all  at  the  Syracuse  House.  However,  I  got  them  all  com- 
fortably to  bed  before  midnight,  and  a  thankful  man  I  was  to  get 
my  own  bones  fairly  under  the  sheet. 

"Thursday,  June  12,  1845.  Rose  at  5  a.  m.,  breakfasted  at  6.15, 
and  having  got  all  of  our  'little  fixin's  '  completed,  saw  the  bag- 
gage into  the  baggage  car,  got  checks  for  it,  and  got  Harriet  and 
the  infantry  all  seated  in  the  last  car,  and  the  hindmost  part  of  it,  so 
that  we  saw  the  country  behind  us.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Leroy  with  their 
daughter,  who  was   at    school  with    my    three  girls    at  Mrs.  Law- 


62  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

rence's  in  New  York,  were  in  the  car.  Mrs.  Leroy  came  and  in- 
troduced herself  to  Harriet  as  an  old  friend,  having  been  a  Miss 
Fish.  They  left  New  Orleans  May  22,  having  come  by  St.  Louis 
and  the  Lakes.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Leroy  were  wrecked  on  the  Bahamas 
going  to  New  Orleans.  They  Avent  south  for  the  benefit  of  Miss 
Leroy's  health.  We  took  a  sort  of  snack  for  dinner  at  Palatine 
Bridge  :  ice  cream,  and  fruit  pies,  for  which  I  paid  $1.84.  We 
reached  Schenectady  about  half  past  three.  Got  the  baggage  moved 
to  the  Saratoga  train,  and  reached  the  United  States  Hotel,  Saratoga, 
about  6  p.  M.,  exactly  twenty  days  from  leaving  New  Orleans,  and  I 
am  sure  we  have  reason  to  thank  God  for  all  his  mercies  during  this 
long  journey.  The  journey,  including  the  day's  visit  .to  Niagara 
Falls,  has  cost  me  $602.46  (the  visit  to  Niagara,  $15).  We  have 
a  delightful  suite  of  rooms  at  the  United  States  Hotel,  four  bed- 
rooms (one  double)  and  a  parlor,  en  suite,  in  the  family  house 
across  from  the  large  hotel.  Wrote  to  Eliza  and  the  '  trio  '  [A.  D., 
Jno  D.,  and  Wm.  Cross],  also  to  Dennistoun  &  Co.,  telling  them  to 
send  me  $400,  in  $50  notes,  cut  in  halves.  I  also  wrote  to  Maria 
De  Peyster. 

"Friday,  June  13,  1845.  A  beautiful  day,  rose  at  six,  and  went 
with  Harriet  and  Bessie  to  Congress  Spring,  and  drank  the  water. 
After  breakfast  counted  out  the  dirty  clothes  by  way  of  occupying 
my  time  ;  then  read  D'Aubigne's  '  History  of  the  Reformation,'  then 
walked  with  Harriet  and  the  children,  but  felt  the  want  of  occupa- 
tion. After  dinner  wrote  to  Cross,  correcting  May  4,  for  April  19. 
At  five,  thermometer  78°  in  the  shade. 

"  Sunday,  June  15,  1845.  Heard  a  very  fair  sermon  in  the  morn- 
ing at  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  where  we  went  with  J. 
Walter,  Charlotte,  and  Bessie.  In  the  evening  we  intended  to  go 
to  the  Presbyterian  Church,  but  finding  it  shut  we  went  again  to  the 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church  and  heard  another  fairish  sermon, 
both  from  strangers.  This  evening  got  my  English  letters  up  till 
May  20 ;  '  a  mingled  yarn.' 

"  Monday,  June  16,  1845.  Chartered  an  open  carriage,  and  took 
Harriet  and  the  five  eldest  children  to  Saratoga  Lake,  six  miles  and 
back,  a  fine  day  and  a  delightful  drive  ;  cost  three  dollars — fifty 
cents  for  lemonade  and  ten  cents  to  waiter.  We  saw  live  trout 
in  a  small  cistern,  ready  to  be  taken  out  and  cooked  ;  they  are  fed 


RETURN   JOURNEY   TO   NEW   YORK   WITH    MY   FAMILY.     63 

with  fresh  meat  and  are  very  fat.  They  are  curiously  streaked  in 
waving  lines,  like  a  serpent's  back. 

"Tuesday,  June  17,  1845.  Very  cold,  thermometer  at  9.45,  58°. 
Mr.  Fred.  G.  Foster  arrived.  John  Walter  and  I  took  a  ride  on 
horseback  in  the  morning,  some  twenty-five  miles,  on  the  ridge  of 
hills  near  Saratoga,  and  had  a  most  beautiful  view  extending  from 
the  Green  Mountains  of  Vermont,  far  to  the  westward.  Neither  of  us 
being  very  great  horsemen,  we  were  afraid  to  turn  our  horses  Sara- 
toga-ward, lest  they  should  run  off  with  us.  [This  horseback  ride 
on  June  17,1845,  is  the  last  time  I  crossed  a  horse's  back,  now 
March  8,  1891,  some  forty-six  years  ago.]  In  the  evening,  Foster, 
Harriet,  and  I,  and  Charlotte  and  J.  Walter,  drove  by  Bartlet's  to 
the  lake — a  very  pleasant  day. 

"  June  18,  1845.  Thirtieth  anniversary  of  Waterloo.  Mr.  De 
Peyster  arrived  to-day,  looking  well,  and  very  kind  and  friendly. 
He  and  Foster  and  four  more  gentlemen  set  off  to  look  into  the 
affairs   of   the    Peru    Iron    Company. 

"  June  19,  1845.  Took  a  drive  to  Ten  Springs,  with  Harriet  ;  J. 
Walter  riding  on  horseback  beside  us.     Cost  one  dollar. 

"  June  20,  1845.  Nothing  new.  Had  a  pleasant  evening  with  the 
Cottonets,  hearing  music  and  watching  the  young  ladies  and  gentle- 
men dance.  One  of  the  latter  was  William  Schermerhorn,  who  is 
engaged  to  Miss  Cottonet. 

"  2ist.     Wrote  a  long  business  letter  to  Murray  Thomson. 

"Sunday,  June  22,  1845.  Heard  Bishop  Hobart's  son  preach,  in 
a  white  surplice,  a  regular  Puseyite  sermon  advocating  the  real 
presence. 

"  Monday,  June  23,  1845.  Left  Saratoga  for  Albany  with  Mr. 
De  Peyster  and  Foster.  Called  on  the  Kanes  at  Schenectady  ;  saw 
Jane  and  Catherine  Kane.*  Walked  about  Albany  with  Paschal 
Strong,  Mrs.  Smyth's  second  son  by  her  first  husband,  the  Rev_ 
Paschal  Strong  of  the  Collegiate  Dutch  Church  of  New  York  City  ; 
saw  the  Patroon's  house  ;  the  new  cemetery  ;  dined  and  took  tea  at 
Mrs.  Forsyth's,  where  we  met  Mr.  James  Kane,  Harriet's  uncle. 

*  At  Albany  we  saw  Cornelia  (Mrs.  Smyth)  and  her  daughter,  Mrs.  Forsyth  ;  the 
former  Harriet's  eldest  sister.  I  was  introduced  at  the  State  House  to  Mr.  Camp- 
bell, Secretary  of  State  and  father  of  Allan  Campbell  of  New  York,  who  has  since 
held  many  offices  in  this  city,  among  them  that  of  comptroller. 


64  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

"  June  25,  1845.  We  left  Albany  at  7  a.  m.  by  the  steamer  Troy ; 
the  day  beautiful.  Mr.  F.  De  Peyster  joined  us  at  Red  Hook.  Mrs. 
D.  Golden  and  two  little  Misses  Wilkes  came  on  board  at  Hyde 
Park.  We  all  enjoyed  the  sail  very  much.  Near  Yonkers  saw  many 
steam  yachts  which  had  brought  ladies  and  gentlemen  to  a  fine /<?/<? 
given  by  Mr.  Thomas  Ludlow.  We  landed  at  New  York  at  5  p.  m. 
Thank  God,  all  well  and  in  undiminished  numbers  after  an  absence 
of  six  months  and  four  days.  Went  to  the  New  York  Hotel.  In 
the  evening  saw  Mrs.  Hone  and  Margaret,  Harriet  and  Emily  Mills, 
W.  H.  Neilson,  Dawson,  Johnnie  Hone,  John  Yuille,  and  Mrs.  De 
Peyster. 


CHAPTER   V. 

THE    LAST    SUMMER   OF    MY    LIFE    WITH    HARRIET    IN    NEW  YORK. 

"  Wednesday,  July  2,  1845.  Went  up  to  Glen  Cove,  Long  Island, 
with  Harriet  and  the  children. 

"  Friday,  July  4,  1845.  Drove  with  the  De  Peysters,  Winthrops, 
and  Fosters  to  Hog  Island,  in  three  carriages.  Asked  to  dinner  at 
the  Winthrops',  but  Maria  De  Peyster  thought  we  had  better  not 
come,  owing  to  the  paucity  of  knives  and  forks  and  plates,  etc.  In 
the  evening  we  had  a  triste  ball  at  the  hotel. 

"  Saturday,  July  5,  1845,  Received  Wm.  Cross'  letter  of  June  18 
with  the  resolution  of  the  trio  that  I  should  spend  another  winter  in 
New  Orleans.  Eheu  !  I  am  afraid  this  will  separate  me  from  my 
beloved  Harriet  and  the  children,  but  I  did  what  I  could  to  get 
home,  and  left  the  matter  in  the  hands  of  God,  therefore  let  me  learn 
to  submit  and  be  contented,  confident  that  he  will  provide  for  them 
and  me.  I  trust  he  will  direct  me  as  to  leaving  them  here  or  taking 
them  with  me.*  This  is  a  great  disappointment  both  to  Harriet 
and  me.  Received  kind  and  pleasant  letters  from  Mary  and  Anna, 
and  also  from  Eliza. 

"  Saturday,  July  12,  1845.  Harriet  went  with  Charlotte,  Bessie, 
and  little  Harriet  to  New  Rochelle  to  visit  her  old  friend  Mrs. 
Brinckerhoff,  «/<?  Alethea  Macfarlane.  She  spent  a  pleasant  day 
with  her,  I  took  them  down  from  Glen  Cove  to  New  Rochelle  and 
left  them  there,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Brinckerhoff  meeting  them  with  their 
carriage.  Then,  in  the  afternoon,  coming  up  in  the  steamer  from 
New  York,  they  got  on  board  at  New  Rochelle  and  proceeded  with 
me  to  Glen  Cove.     In  Wall  Street  thermometer  93^°  in  shade. 

"Sunday,  July  13,  1845.  Horrid  prayer  at  Methodist  church; 
rose  and  came  away. 

"July  15,   1845.     Left  New  York  at  5   p.   M.   ^^x  Massachusetts, 

*  This  was  a  most  important  epoch  in  my  life,  without  my  knowing  it,  and  was 
the  causa  causarum  of  my  becoming  an  American  citizen  and  settling  in  this 
country. 

6s 


66  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

taking  John  Walter  with  me,  for  Newport  and  Providence  ;  reached 
the  Tremont  House,  Boston,  next  day  at  8.30  a.  m. 

"  Called  on  A.  &  A.  Lawrence,  Milk  Street  ;  saw  a  variety  of 
American  goods  and  the  managing  partner,  Mr.  Wolcott.  Left  D. 
&  Co.'s  circular  and  various  references  to  bankers  in  London, 
Liverpool,  New  Orleans,  etc.,  etc.  Also  called  on  J.  W.  Paige  & 
Co.,  Ill  Milk  Street  ;  gave  them  also  D.  &  Co.'s  circular;  spoke 
of  consignments  to  A.  &  J.  D.  &  Co.  of  New  Orleans,  and  gave 
references.  Also  on  Mr.  B.  C.  White,  47  Central  Wharf  ;  he  is  Mr. 
Dawson's  Boston  agent,  and  is  concerned  in  the  ships  Parthenon^ 
Cairo,  and  Lapland,  which  go  to  New  Orleans,  and  told  him  that  A. 
&  J.  D.  &  Co.  would  be  happy  to  give  them  a  preference  on  equal 
terms.     Saw  passengers  setting  off  per  Acadia  to  Liverpool. 

"  Thursday,  July  17,  1845.  Walked  to  the  Tea  Wharf  at  Boston 
with  John  Walter,  and  then  across  the  peninsula  to  Leverett  Street 
and  Charles  River  swimming  bath.  Dined  at  half  past  one.  Heard 
of  the  death  and  burial  of  Mr.  Balcombe,  said  to  be  a  son  of  the 
Dean  of  York  ;  died  last  night  at  seven.  I  am  told  he  was  a  fine- 
looking,  but  wild,  young  man  of  twenty-four  ;  came  to  the  Tremont 
Hotel  on  Sunday  last,  got  into  a  row  and  was  taken  to  the  watch- 
house  on  Tuesday,  and  died  in  the  hotel,  far  away  from  all  friends, 
on  Wednesday,  and  was  buried  this  (Thursday)  morning. 

"At  2.30  p.  M.  started  by  the  Portland  Railway,  130  miles  long, 
for  Newburyport,  thirty-two  miles  from  Boston.  Mr.  Ben.  Poore 
met  us  at  the  station  with  his  barouche.  By  the  way,  most  of  the 
railroad  from  Boston  was  over  salt  marshes  and  along  the  sea-coast. 
We  passed  through  Salem,  a  seat  of  the  China  and  East  India  trade. 
Mr.  Poore  took  us  through  a  beautiful  mill  and  power-loom  factory, 
called  the  James  Mill,  after  the  manager.  I  never  saw  a  finer 
steam-engine  in  my  life  ;  most  beautiful  cogs  on  flywheel  ;  cylinders 
horizontal.  I  also  visited  the  Bartlett  Mill,  likewise  a  very  fair 
factory.  The  mill  girls  were  many  of  them  very  pretty  and  lady- 
like, and  all  modest-looking.  Two  of  them  are  building  a  house  for 
their  parents  at  a  cost  of  $1600.  From  six  to  ten  per  cent,  of  them 
cease  working  during  the  three  hot  months,  and,  by  so  doing,  throw  an 
equal  percentage  of  the  machinery  out  of  operation.  Wages  $4-50 
per  week  without  board,  and  $2.50  per  week  with  board.  The 
James  Mill  makes  beautifully  fine  shirting,  or  long  cloth,  to  sell  at 


LAST  SUMMER  OF  MY  LIFE  WITH  HARRIET  IN  NEW  YORK.   6/ 

about  fourteen  cents  per  yard.  There  are  twenty-four  schools  in 
Newburyport,  with  a  population  of  eight  thousand.  Excellent  educa- 
tion gratis.  No  young  person  under  twelve  allowed  to  work  more 
than  nine  months  out  of  twelve  ;  the  other  three  must  be  spent  at 
school.  From  the  abundance  of  public  schools,  there  are  no  schools 
attached  to  the  mills  ;  but  all  the  overseers  of  mills  must  insist  on  all 
the  operatives  attending  some  church  on  Sundays,  and  they  are  very 
particular  about  the  character  of  the  workers  ;  any  flaw  in  that  respect 
results  in  immediate  dismissal. 

"  Mr.  Poore  gave  us  a  beautiful  drive  in  his  barouche  through  a 
country  old  and  well  settled,  with  fine  elm  trees,  very  like  many 
parts  of  England.  We  arrived  at  Indian  Hill  Farm  about  7  p.  m., 
a  curious  old-fashioned  place.  There  is  a  fine  old  hall  in  the  center 
of  the  house  with  a  gallery  running  round  it,  to  which  you  ascend 
by  stairs,  and  the  hall  is  wainscoted.  The  property  was  bought 
from  the  Indians  by  Mr.  Poore's  ancestors.  He  himself  is  the  eighth 
in  lineal  descent  from  the  purchaser  from  the  Indians,  and  the  prop- 
erty is  now  settled  on  his  son,  who  is  traveling  in  Palestine,  and  has 
been  three  years  in  Paris  studying  civil  law,  with  a  view  to  practic- 
ing in  Louisiana  as  a  lawyer.  Mr.  Poore  is  related  to  Sir  Edward 
Poore,  of  a  place  near  Lyndhurst  in  England,  and  who  married  a 
sister  of  the  beautiful  Miss  MacLean.  I  met  Lieutenant  Sir  Edward 
Poore  at  Golfhill  twenty  years  ago  ;  he  was  then  in  a  regiment  of 
dragoons  quartered  at  Glasgow,  came  to  Golfhill  in  his  handsome 
uniform,  and  after  dinner  sang  a  fine  bass  song  for  myself  and  some 
of  my  college  companions,  whom  my  grandfather  had  asked  to  din- 
ner along  with  myself.  Mr.  Poore  and  his  wife  and  daughter  visited 
Sir  Edward  Poore  in  1831-32,  and  regularly  correspond  with  him. 
Mr.  Poore  showed  me  a  large  quarto  volume  presented  to  him  by 
the  Vicar  of  Salisbury,  wherein  he  (Mr.  Poore)  is  described  as  a 
lineal  descendant  of  a  brother  of  the  Bishop  Poore  who  founded 
Salisbury  Cathedral.  Mr.  Poore  beside  his  son  Benjamin  now  in 
Syria,  has  a  daughter,  Louise,  a  pretty,  intelligent  girl  of  seventeen, 
not  unlike  our  Charlotte,  and  another  son  named  Walter  Scott. 

"  Both  J.  Walter  and  I  were  very  much  put  out  when  the  pretty 
Louise  Poore  waited  upon  us  at  dinner,  and  wanted  to  wait  on  our- 
selves, but  were  given  to  understand  that  this  was  the  custom  of  the 
house,  so  thought  it  the  best  manners  to  submit. 


68  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"July  i8,  1845.  Visited  a  woolen  factory  at  Amesbury  driven 
by  water  power.     We  returned  to  Boston  in  the  evening. 

"Saturday,  July  19,  1845.  Started  at  7  a.  m.  for  Lowell  and 
visited  the  Merrimack  works,  and  also  the  Massachusetts  Mill. 
These  have  spinning  works,  power  looms,  and  printing  works  ;  also 
the  Middlesex  Woolen  Mill  and  the  Lowell  Carpet  Factory.  We 
saw  Mr.  Sam.  Lawrence,  who  gave  us  a  very  kind  reception  and 
asked  us  to  stay  to  dinner.  He  sent  his  love  to  Harriet,  who  was 
an  old  acquaintance  of  his  before  our  marriage.  We  got  into  the 
carpet  factory,  partly  through  Mr.  Sam.  Lawrence's  introduction 
and  partly  owing  to  my  Scottish  tongue,  Wright,  the  manager,  being 
a  Scotsman.  Saw  carpets  woven  on  power  looms,  which  have 
twenty-six  shuttles  for  different  colors,  and  stop  when  one  of  the 
threads  breaks,  by  means  of  a  piece  of  iron  which  comes  down  on 
the  thread,  and  when  the  latter  is  broken  it  falls  into  a  hole  and 
stops  the  machinery.  A  patent  has  just  been  taken  out  for  making 
Brussels  carpets  on  power  looms.  There  is  beautiful  clear  water 
power  at  Lowell   and  pretty  grounds  about  the  factories. 

"  Mr.  Sam.  Lawrence's  firm  is  Lawrence  &  Stone  ;  a  Mr.  Kellogg 
went  with  us.  On  our  return  to  Boston  we  called  on  A.  &  A. 
Lawrence  and  W.  L  Paige  &  Co.,  and  got  samples  and  prices  of  goods. 
Both  houses  execute  orders  for  the  goods  which  they  sell.  They 
charge  no  commission  or  brokerage,  and  nothing  for  packing,  all 
these  items  are  included  in  the  price  of  the  goods.  Nearly  half 
of  all  the  goods  they  sell  are  sold  in  this  way.  They  have  list 
prices,  which  they  alter  from  time  to  time  but  don't  sell  below  the 
rates  on  the  existing  list.  We  dined  at  the  Tremont,  and  left 
Boston  by  the  Western  Railway  at  4  p.  m.  for  New  Haven,  but 
found  that  the  train  stopped  at  Hartford,  no  miles  from  Boston, 
where  we  arrived  at  10  p.  m.,  having  been  detained  nearly  half  an 
hour  at  Springfield.  En  route  my  right  eye  was  nearly  put  out 
by  a  burr  thrown  from  a  railway  carriage  passing  us.  I  thought 
it  was  out,  because  for  an  hour  or  two  I  could  not  see  by  it, 
but  it  was  merely  paralyzed,  for  gradually  I  could  see  the 
light  with  it,  and  at  last  the  sight  was  perfectly  restored.  The 
country  we  passed  through  was  rocky  and  picturesque,  but  no 
high  hills.     We  put  up  at  the  City  Hotel,  Hartford. 

"  Sunday,  July  20,   1845.     Heard  in  the  morning  Dr.  Halsey,  a 


LAST  SUMMER  OF  MY  LIFE  WITH  HARRIET  IN  NEW  YORK.   69 

Congregational  minister,  and  a  strange  minister  in  another  Congre- 
gational church  in  the  afternoon.  Fine  singing  in  both,  and  organ. 
The  second  was  a  very  handsome  church,  both  lofty.  There  are  in 
Hartford  four  Congregational,  two  Episcopal,  two  Baptist,  and  two 
Methodist  cliurches.  The  population  is  about  ten  thousand. 
There  is  a  fine  deaf  and  dumb  asylum,  and  a  pretty  walk  towards  it. 

"Monday,  July  21,  1845.  We  saw  the  Wadsworth  Museum  of 
Antiquities,  among  them  a  three-legged  pot  of  Miles  Standish,  and 
also  a  wooden  chest,  both  said  to  have  come  over  in  the  Mayflower^ 
also  a  picture  of  Benjamin  West  by  Laurens,  and  a  glaring  battle- 
piece  by  Trumbull.     Dr.  Robbins,  the  librarian,  is  an  old  antiquary. 

"  Mr.  Baman  took  us  through  the  State  House,  and  showed  us  the 
charter  of  Charles  H.,  signed  Howard  ;  no  signature  of  the  king,  but 
there  is  a  likeness  of  him  at  the  beginning,  engrossed  on  vellum,  and 
weather-stained  from  lying  in  the  Charter  Oak  for  concealment  when 
Governor  Andros  came  to  try  and  carry  off  the  charter.  There  is  a 
fine  view  from  the  top  of  the  State  House  of  the  beautiful  valley  of 
the  Connecticut  up  toward  Mount  Holyoke.  We  also  went  and  saw 
the  Charter  Oak,  a  fine  old  tree  on  the  Willis  place,  in  a  street  front- 
ing a  Congregational  church  in  Main  Street  ;  the  tree  is  hollow. 
Mr.  Baman  is  to  give  me  a  letter  to  Professor  Larned  at  New 
Haven,  where  we  arrived  about  noon,  after  passing  through  several 
miles  of  a  sandy  desert,  looking  like  the  bottom  of  some  primeval 
sea  ;  then  between  the  East  and  West  Rocks,  where  Goffe  and 
Whalley,  two  of  the  judges  of  Charles  I.,  hid  themselves,  and  who 
were  subsequently  concealed  by  the  Rev.  John  Russell  for  seventeen 
years.  He  was  minister  of  Wethersfield,  and  then  carried  his 
church  to  Hadley,  1659.  He  died  November  10,  1662.  Hadley  was 
attacked  by  the  Indians,  and  then  Colonels  Goffe  and  Whalley 
sallied  out  fully  armed  to  assist  the  inhabitants,  and  put  the  Indians 
to  flight.  There  is  an  engraving  of  this  skirmish  with  the  Indians, 
which  I  have  seen  either  at  Hadley  or  Northampton,  Mass.  The 
Rev.  John  Russell  was  a  remote  ancestor  of  Harriet's  through  the 
Kanes,  Mosses,  and  Russells.  See  Tom  Kane's  elaborate  genealogy 
in  my  H.  A.  W.  book. 

"  We  put  up  at  the  Pavilion  Hotel,  New  Haven,  and  after  dinner 
drove  up  in  the  omnibus  with  Professor  Larned  to  Yale  College,  a 
brick  building,  with  a  fine  avenue  of  elms.     I  was  disappointed  with 


70  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

the  buildings  ;  there  is  a  fine  collection  of  minerals,  Trumbull's 
paintings,  etc.,  etc.  In  the  evening  had  a  long  conversation  with 
Professor  Larned,  who  told  me  that  Yale  College  was  founded  by 
the  Congregationalists,  and  is  filled  by  them.  They  also  founded 
and  still  possess  the  following  colleges  in  New  England,  to  wit : 
Bowdoin  College,  Maine  ;  Dartmouth  College,  New  Hampshire  ; 
Middlebury  College,  Vermont ;  *  Vermont  University,  Vermont  ; 
Williams  College,  Massachusetts  ;  Amherst  College,  Massachusetts. 
They  also  founded  Harvard  College,  Cambridge,  Mass.,  but  it  has 
passed  into  the  hands  of  the  Unitarians. 

"  Professor  Larned  wished  to  exchange  reviews  with  the  English 
Congregationalists  ;  his  is  the  New  Englander,  published  quarterly  at 
New  Haven.     I  asked  him  to  visit  me  at  Liverpool  or  New  York. 

"Tuesday,  July  22,  1845.  Arrived  in  New  York  at  4  a.  m.  per 
Champion  steamer.  Saw  the  Fish  Market  at  Fulton  Street  and  the 
ruins  of  the  great  fire  before  breakfast,  which  meal  we  took  at  Del- 
monico's.  Busy  in  the  office  all  day.  Found  my  blessed  wife  and 
dear  children  all  well  at  Glen  Cove,  thank  God  !  " 

From  July  23  till  August  5,  living  with  my  wife  and  children  at 
Glen  Cove  Hotel,  and  bathing  every  day.  John  Walter  swam  across 
the  mouth  of  Hempstead  Harbor,  half  a  mile,  I  should  think.  One 
day  we  all  crossed  in  a  boat,  and  clambered  up  an  immense  bowlder 
on  the  shore,  when  Harriet  got  so  frightened  at  the  descent  that  we 
were  afraid  she  would  not  have  courage  to  attempt  it  ;  however,  she 
did  eventually  get  down. 

On  August  5  I  stayed  at  home,  and  Harriet  and  I,  with  little 
Harriet  and  Willie  and  Charles  Winthrop,  drove  to  Oyster  Bay,  and, 
on  return,  spent  the  rest  of  the  day  at  Dosoris.  Next  day  also 
stayed  at  home  ;  bathed  ;  walked  with  Harriet  in  the  morning  through 
the  wood  and  on  the  beach.     Began  to  read  Disraeli's  "  Sibyl." 

I  continued  to  go  down  to  New  York  to  business,  coming  up  by 
the  afternoon  boat,  but  sometimes  taking  a  holiday  and  remaining 
up  at  Glen  Cove  all  day  with  Harriet  and  the  children.  I  note 
she  was  in  bed  with  a  bilious  attack  on  August   23,  184S,  when   I 

*  Little  did  I  tliink  and  less  did  I  imagine  that  it  should  bestow  upon  me  on 
July  3,  1878,  the  degree  of  LL.  D.,  when  I  was  president  of  the  New  York  Board 
of  Education. 


LAST  SUMMER  OF  MY  LIFE  WITH  HARRIET  IN  NEW  YORK.    /I 

Stayed  up  all  day  and  had  much  quiet  converse,  and  was  built  up  in 
the  faith  by  her.  There  was  a  tremendous  storm  of  thunder  and 
lightning.  I  bathed  after  dinner.  After  tea  Mr.  Ogden,  Abraham, 
I  think,  told  me  that  American  whale  ships  have  under  the  copper 
a  coat  of  chunam  ;  that  is,  fine  lime  mixed  with  whale-oil  ;  this  is  put 
next  the  wood,  and  then  the  copper  sheathing  is  nailed  on.  Tom 
Sellar  came  up  from  New  York,  and  the  three  Mills  girls  were  here. 
On  Wednesday,  September  3,  1845,  left  Glen  Cove  for  the  New 
York  Hotel,  where  we  arrived  about  11  A.  m.,  and  occupied  rooms 
15^5  i59>  ^60,  161,  and  163,  on  the  ground  floor,  fronting  onWaverly 
Place. 

"Thursday,  September  11,  1845.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Isaac  Buchanan 
of  Canada,  William  C.  Mylne,  William  H.  Neilson,  and  Tom  Sellar 
dined  with  us. 

"  Monday,  September  15,  1845.  We  were  married  this  day  fifteen 
years  ago.  The  four  elder  children  dined  with  us,  and  we  had  a 
bottle  of  Heidseck  champagne.  After  dinner  Harriet  and  I  walked 
to  Maria  De  Peyster's.  Charles  Winthrop  and  his  son,  Robert,  and 
Mylne  and  Tom  Sellar  called  in  the  evening.     A  fine,  full  moon. 

"  On  Tuesday,  September  23, 1845,  we  left  New  York  at  9  a.  m.  for 
Philadelphia  per  railway  from  Jersey  City,  via  Newark,  Trenton, 
etc.,  to  Bristol  on  the  Delaware,  where  we  took  the  steamer  New 
Philadelphia  to  Philadelphia,  and  arrived  there  about  3  P.  m.  I 
found  Tom  Kane  waiting  for  me.  We  got  a  coach,  and  dropping 
William  Mylne  at  Jones'  Hotel,  Chestnut  Street,  drove  to  Mr.  Kane's 
house,  corner  of  Locust  and  Schuylkill  Seventh  Streets  ;  this  means 
the  seventh  street  from  the  Schuylkill  River.  Broad  Street  divides 
Philadelphia,  running  from  north  to  south.  Towards  Broad  Street 
the  streets  running  north  and  south  are  numbered,  beginning  No.  i, 
each  river,  so  you  have  i,  2,  etc.,  etc.,  Delaware,  and  i,  2,  etc., 
Schuylkill.  Mr.  John  K.  Kane  is  attorney-general  of  Pennsylvania, 
and  a  leading  Democratic  politician.  He  is  a  most  gentlemanly 
and  intelligent  man,  about  forty-eight.  His  wife,  who  was  a  Miss 
Leiper,  is  a  beautiful  woman,  about  forty-five,  the  daughter  of  a 
leading  Democrat  of  the  Revolution,  Thomas  Leiper,  nicknamed 
'  Old  Kingdom,  '  who  was  by  birth  a  Scotsman,  from  Strathaven, 
Lanarkshire,  and  came  out  before  the   Revolution  to  Philadelphia, 


^2  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

with  seventy  guineas  in  his  pocket,  but  died  a  very  wealthy  man. 
He  was  a  great  friend  and  correspondent  of  President  Jefferson. 
Mr.  J.  K.  Kane's  family  consists  of  Dr.  ElishaKane,  aged  24  ;  Tom, 
22  ;  Robert  Patterson  (or  Pat),  17  ;  John,  14  or  15  ;  Elizabeth 
(Bessie),  13  ;  William,  about  6  or  7,  a  little  white-headed  urchin. 

"  Tom  and  I  went  and  called  at  Dr.  Patterson's  ;  he  married  a 
sister  of  Mrs.  Kane,  and  is  Director  of  the  Mint.  We  heard  their 
daughter,  Miss  Helen  Patterson,  sing  very  beautifully. 

"  September  24,  1845.  Visited  the  Philadelphia  High  School,  and 
was  highly  pleased  with  the  natural  history  class,  and  the  mode  of 
ascertaining  the  conduct  of  each  boy,  each  class,  and  the  whole 
school.  Supposing  100  perfection,  then  87  is  the  normal  condition  of 
the  school,  and  it  does  not  differ  from  year  to  year  more  than  by 
unity.  In  case  of  the  average  in  any  week  going  below  this,  the 
principal  ascertains  which  class  is  below  par,  and  then  which  boy. 
If  one  boy  or  more  in  a  class  be  bad,  then  all  the  others  try  to  raise 
him  or  them  for  their  own  sakes.  The  marks  are  given  publicly, 
and  there  is  an  appeal  on  the  boys'  part  from  the  class  teacher  to 
the  principal,  and  then  from  him  to  the  managing  committee. 

"Went  in  the  afternoon  to  the  Blind  School  with  Dr.  Patterson  and 
Mr.  Kane,  who  are  directors,  and  was  highly  delighted  with  the 
music,  vocal  and  instrumental.  I  saw  there  Bishop  Chase  of 
Illinois. 

"  In  the  evening  went  to  Mr.  Sam.  Davis'  to  a  party,  and  met  Dr. 
and  Mrs.  and  Miss  Duncan  of  Natchez,  and  was  introduced  to  Miss 
Linton. 

"  September  25,  1845.  Visited  the  Eastern  Penitentiary,  which  is  a 
fine,  clean,  well-ventilated  building.  It  can  hold  five  hundred  pris- 
oners ;  among  them  only  twenty  v/omen  and  one  Scotsman.  You  can 
see  from  the  center  down  six  galleries  ;  each  has  two  stories,  with  cells 
on  both  sides.  Cells  large,  airy,  and  clean,  heated  by  steampipes  ; 
each  has  water-closet  stool  ;  then  there  are  baths.  No  prisoner  sees 
another,  and  they  are  only  known  by  their  numbers.  Each  cell  has 
a  little  yard  for  exercise,  and  invalid  prisoners  are  allowed  to  work 
in  a  large  garden,  but  only  one  at  a  time.  The  prison  is  situated 
one  hundred  feet  above  the  Schuylkill,  with  good  drainage. 

"  We  afterward  visited  Girard  College,  which  is  built  of  white 
marble,  eight  columns  in  a  row  in  front  and  behind,  and  nine  on 


LAST  SUMMER  OF  MY  LIFE  WITH  HARRIET  IN  NEW  YORK.    73 

each  side,  making  thirty-four  splendid  fluted  Corinthian  or  composite 
pillars,  six  feet  in  diameter.  All  the  building  is  of  white  marble 
and  likewise  the  roof,  which  forms  a  magnificent  promenade,  from 
which  you  have  a  fine  view  of  Philadelphia  and  the  surrounding 
country. 

"  We  then  drove  to  Laurel  Hill  Cemetery  on  the  banks  of  the 
Schuylkill ;  there  I  saw  a  statue  of  Walter  Scott  and  Old  Mortality, 
in  red  sandstone,  with  the  horse  of  the  latter,  all  by  Thom,  in  bad 
taste,  the  horse  the  best  of  the  three.  The  grounds  tastefully  laid 
out,  many  of  the  tombstones  with  single  names,  as  '  Willie,' 
*  Emma,' etc. ;  nearly  all  the  tombstones  white  marble.  Mr.  Kane's 
lot  is  on  the  banks  of  the  Schuylkill,  and  is  a  cell,  with  a  plain 
Etruscan  or  Egyptian  doorway  of  granite,  with  an  iron  door.  I 
saw  the  tomb  of  Commodore  Isaac  Hull,  with  a  marble  eagle  and 
American  flag. 

"  In  the  evening  called  with  Mr.  J.  K.  Kane  on  Vice  President 
Dallas,  and  was  introduced  to  him  and  Mrs.  Dallas.  He  is  very  like 
Mirabeau,  with  long  white  hair  ;  he  is  also  like  John  Holmes  of 
Liverpool. 

"September  26,  1843.  Visited  the  almshouse  with  Dr.  Kane.  It 
is  across  the  Schuylkill  ;  it  is  very  clean  and  airy,  with  apparently 
plenty  of  good  food.  Old  men  and  their  wives  live  here  ;  also 
insane  and  other  diseased  persons,  but  all  classified  in  wards. 
There  is  a  fine  garden,  with  Isabella  and  Catawba  grapes.  Old  Mr. 
Graham,  the  gardener,  a  Scotsman,  once  worked  for  the  Duke  of 
Buccleuch,  Dalkeith  Palace. 

"  I  succeeded  in  my  business  arrangements  with  Mr.  Davis,  and 
am  fully  persuaded  of  the  efficacy  of  a  believing  Christian's  prayer 
even  as  to  temporal  matters. 

"  Mr.  John  K.  Kane  told  me  how  his  and  Harriet's  Grandfather 
Kane  came  to  join  the  Royalists  of  the  Revolution.  He  was 
elected  to  the  First  Continental  Congress,  but  declined  to  sit.  He 
was  also  elected  colonel  of  the  Dutchess  County  militia  of  New 
York.  One  day  a  dragoon  brought  a  British  protection,  sup- 
posed to  have  been  obtained  through  Captain  Gilbert  Livingston 
of  the  British  army,  who  married  Miss  Kane,  eldest  daughter  of 
John  Kane  and  Sybil  Kent.  This  occurred  during  Mr.  Kane's 
absence  from  home.     His  wife  sewed  the  document  in  the  pillow- 


74  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

case,  but  afterwards  boasted  of  her  daughter's  influence  to  some- 
one who  betrayed  her  confidence.  A  guard  was  sent  by  the 
Americans  to  arrest  Colonel  Kane.  He  denied  having  any  Brit- 
ish protection,  but  the  captain  of  the  guard  walked  right  to  the 
bedroom,  cut  open  the  pillow,  and  took  out  the  protection.  It  is 
said  in  the  family  that  this  was  the  only  occasion  on  which  he 
ever  spoke  harshly  to  his  wife.  He  was  marched  off  to  West 
Point,  tried  by  court  martial,  and  honorably  acquitted.  But  on 
returning  home  he  found  that  he  had  been  superseded  in  his 
command,  became  disgusted,  and  went  over  to  the  British  lines. 
The  Americans  confiscated  his  property,  attainted  him,  and  set  a 
price  on  his  head,  and  the  attainder  was  only  reversed  within  the  life- 
time of  Mr.  J.  K.  Kane.  From  other  sources  I  have  learned  that 
Colonel  Kane  was  first  sent  to  Poughkeepsie  jail  and  kept  there 
for  a  good  while  ;  that  he  applied  to  Washington  through  a  young 
lawyer  whom  he  had  befriended  in  earlier  days  ;  that  this  young 
lawyer  was  John  Jay,  afterward  Chief  Justice  of  the  United  States  ; 
and  that  he  was  at  length  set  at  liberty  ;  but  probably  he  was  at 
last  promptly  sent  to  West  Point,  tried,  and  acquitted.  The  daugh- 
ters of  Colonel  Kane  were  all  beautiful  women,  and  as  early  as  the 
last  term  of  Washington's  presidency,  at  the  last  reception  he  had, 
three  of  them  sang  together  the  then  fashionable  song  of  '  A  Rose 
Tree  in  Full  Bearing.' 

"Wednesday,  October  i,  1845.  A  lovely  day.  Mrs.  De  Peyster, 
Harriet,  and  I,  with  Willie  and  little  Emily  Hone,  drove  to  Colonel 
Monroe's  beautiful  place  on  the  Hudson,  about  eight  miles  from 
New  York  ;  saw  Mrs.  and  Miss  Monroe,  as  well  as  the  colonel  and  a 
nephew.  The  colonel  himself  is  a  nephew  of  President  Monroe,  and 
he  married  Miss  Betsy  Mary  Douglas,  with  whom  Oliver  Kane, 
Harriet's  brother,  was  in  love  at  one  time,  and,  oddly  enough,  also 
my  handsome  uncle,  James  Dennistoun,  who,  when  he  was  in  the 
United  States  about  1819-20,  was  called  'the  destroying  angel' 
by  the  Baltimore  belles  of  that  day. 

"Thursday,  October  2,  1845.  Crossed  with  Harriet  and  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Fred.  De  Peyster  to  Brooklyn  by  the  South  Ferry,  from 
which  we  drove  to  Greenwood  Cemetery,  where  there  are  beautiful 
drives  laid  out  for  ten  miles  over  undulating  ground,  commanding 
splendid  views  of  the  Hudson  and  the  ocean  and  all  the  surrounding 


LAST  SUMMER  OF  MY  LIFE  WITH  HARRIET  IN  NEW  YORK.    75 

country.  The  grounds  are  covered  with  fine  natural  wood  ;  this 
part  of  the  country  is  said  to  be  rather  subject  to  bilious  fever  ;  it 
is  four  miles  from  Brooklyn  down  the  bay.* 

"We  returned  home  by  the  Fulton  Ferry,  which  Mr.  De  P.  and 
even  Harriet  recollect  used  to  be  crossed  by  sailing  boats.  The 
first  time  I  crossed  that  ferry  in  1829  was  in  a  team  boat, 
/.  ^.,  a  boat  moved  by  horses  walking  on  a  horizontal  driving 
wheel. 

"Friday,  October  3, 1845.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  DePeyster,  Harriet,  and 
I  went  to  the  quarantine  ground,  Staten  Island,  eight  miles  from 
New  York,  got  a  barouche  and  drove  to  the  south  end  of  the  island, 
from  whence  we  had  a  fine  view  of  Sandy  Hook  and  the  ocean.  From 
this  we  drove  to  Mr.  John  Anthon's  house,  situated  on  the  top  ridge 
of  the  island.  From  the  house  you  look  down  upon  New  York  Bay, 
upper  and  lower,  over  Long  Island  to  Rockaway  and  the  ocean,  the 
Hudson  up  to  the  Palisades,  New  York,  Brooklyn,  and  Jersey  City, 
Newark,  and  Elizabeth.  The  Anthons  had  two  black  Lorraine 
glasses,  /.  <?.,  small  black  slightly  convex  mirrors,  which,  when  turned 
to  the  landscape  and  looked  into,  gave  a  perfect  miniature  picture 
of  the  surrounding  scenery.  We  plucked  peaches  and  grapes  grown 
in  the  open  air,  bushels  of  the  former  are  given  daily  to  the  pigs. 
The  yellow  are  said  to  be  the  finest.  Mrs.  Anthon  and  her  daugh- 
ters, the  Misses  Joanna  and  Caroline,  are  pleasant  people.  From  the 
Anthons'  we  drove  to  New  Brighton,  at  the  north  end  of  the  island, 
and  visited  the  Sailors'  Snug  Harbor,  under  the  care  of  Captain  De 
Peyster,  a  brother  of  Frederic.  The  building  is  of  white  marble  in 
front,  and  can  hold  400  sailors,  but  only  195  are  in  it  at  present. 
Nine  acres  of  ground  are  surrounded  by  an  expensive  iron  fence 
costing  twenty-five  thousand  dollars,  and  put  up  by  order  of  De 
Peyster  Ogden,  who  used  to  be  United  States  Consul  at  Liverpool. 
This  Sailors'  Snug  Harbor  was  founded  by  a  Captain  Randall,  who 
left  a  farm  for  the  purpose  of  maintaining  it.  The  farm  lies  about 
Washington  Square,  Ninth  and  Tenth  Streets,  and  Fifth  Avenue, 
and  produces  a  yearly  revenue  of  fifty  thousand  dollars. 

*  How  little  any  of  us  thought  that  day  that  my  blessed  Harriet,  the  youngest 
of  the  party,  would,  in  about  six  months  and  a  half,  be  laid  in  her  narrow  bed, 
just  where  we  had  looked  at  one  of  the  finest  views  of  the  Atlantic  from  Ocean 
Hill! 


•J^  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

"  In  the  afternoon  we  gave  a  grand  dinner  party  at  the  New  York 
Hotel.  The  guests  were  Philip  Hone,  Frederic  De  Peyster,  John 
Laurie,  Wm.  More,  British  Consul  at  New  Orleans,  Dr.  Wilkes, 
Samuel  Nicholson  (married  to  Helen  Kane),  David  Golden,  Isaac 
Buchanan,  Pendleton  Hosack,  Thomas  Dixon,  Wm.  C.  Mylne, 
Thomas  Sellar,  and  John  Hone.  My  recollection  is  that  Dr.  Elisha 
K.  Kane  was  there,  and  that  Harriet  presided,  looking  beautiful  as 
usual  ;  the  likeness  between  her  and  Dr.  Kane  was  striking.  Isaac 
Buchanan,  after  dinner,  made  one  of  his  funny  speeches  about  *  the 
best  blood  in  America's  diadem  being  English,'  and  all  in  this 
strain.  Golden  and  some  of  the  others  began  to  bristle  up  at  this 
and  looked  displeased,  when  Buchanan  burst  into  one  of  his  most 
extraordinary  laughs,  and  set  the  whole  party  into  convulsions  of 
laughter  and  hearty  good  humor. 

"October  21,  1845.  My  thirty-seventh  birthday.  Many  and  most 
undeserved  mercies  have  I  enjoyed  during  the  past  year.  My  dear 
wife  and  children  all  spared  to  me  in  good  health  after  all  their 
peril  by  sea  and  land.  Oh,  that  I  might  live  more  to  God  and  less 
to  this  world  !  The  cares  of  business  choke  the  Word  and  '  vain 
thoughts  lodge  within  me,'  about  exchanges  and  cotton,  and  all  such 
worldly  matters.  I  may  truly  say,  '  Lord,  have  mercy  upon  me,  a 
sinner.' 

"I  dined  to-day  at  Mr.  De  Peyster's  with  Harriet,  J.  Walter,  Ghar- 
lotte,  Bessie,  and  little  Harriet  ;  John  Hone  and  his  wife  and  Fred. 
Foster  also  there.  All  very  kind  as  usual.  In  the  evening  called, 
with  De  Peyster,  Maria,  and  Harriet,  and  John  Walter,  at  Mr.  Henry 
Beekman's,  who  is  married  to  Harriet's  cousin,  Catherine  Living- 
ston. She  told  me  that  Harriet's  grandfather's  family  consisted  of : 
Miss  Kane  =  Mrs.  Livingston,  her  mother  ;  Mrs.  Lawrence,  married 
to  Dr.  Lawrence  of  the  British  Army — she  lived  at  Fort  Edward, 
New  York  State  ;  Mrs.  Yates,  wife  of  Governor  Yates  of  New  York, 
she  was  named  Sibyl  Kane — all  the  Yates  have  died  out  ;  Mrs.  Van 
Rensselaer,  Sybella  Adeline  Kane  ;  Mrs.  Thomas  Morris,  Sarah 
Kane.  The  sons  were  :  John,  Harriet's  father  ;  Elisha,*  father  of 
Judge  John  K.  Kane  ;  Elias,  father  of  United  States  Senator  Kane 
of  Illinois  ;  Oliver,*  father  of  Delancey,  Mrs.  Nicholson,  Mrs.  Rus- 
sell, etc.;  Archibald,  went  to  St.  Domingo  and  married  a  half-breed 
daughter   of    the  Emperor    Faustin  ;    James,*   died    a   bachelor  ; 


LAST  SUMMER  OF  MY  LIFE  WITH  HARRIET  IN  NEW  YORK.    JJ 

Charles,*  lived  at  Schenectady,  father  of  the  beautiful  Mrs.  Augusta 
Cobb  of  Boston,  etc.f 

"  October  31,  1845.  There  dined  with  us  at  the  New  York  Hotel 
to-day  the  Rev,  Thomas  Spencer  of  Hawton  Charterhouse,  England, 
near  Bath,  a  great  anti-Corn  Law  and  temperance  man,  with  Mrs. 
Spencer  and  young  James  O.  Heyworth,  a  cousin  of  Lawrence 
Heyworth.  I  asked  to  meet  them  Mr.  and  Mrs.  De  Peyster,  Mr. 
Conway,  Philip  Hone,  J.  R.  Brodhead,  and  Tom  Sellar. 

"  November  14,  1845.  Went  to  Hoboken  with  the  Rev.  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Spencer  and  J.  O.  Heyworth,  crossing  at  the  Canal  Street  ferry  ; 
walked  about  the  woods  at  Hoboken,  and  returned  to  New  York  by 
the  Barclay  Street  ferry.  Took  the  party  to  Columbia  College, 
at  the  west  end  of  Park  Place.  Mr.  Spencer  was  a  Fellow  of  St. 
John's  College,  Cambridge.  He  says  it  is  next  to,  if  not  equal  to. 
Trinity,  and  has  produced  more  senior  wranglers  than  any  other 
college.  Any  boy  who  intends  to  enter  must  be  examined  by  an 
M.  A.,  and  if  he  can  read  the  Greek  Testament  and  some  Latin 
classics,  the  examining  M.  A.  certifies  this  to  the  master  of  the  col- 
lege, who  puts  the  boy's  name  on  the  books,  which  gives  him  the 
choice  of  rooms  the  sooner.  Mr.  Spencer  is  an  M.  A.,  and  would 
give  John  Walter  the  necessary  certificate.  He  says  that  it  ought  not 
to  cost  a  steady  young  man  over  two  hundred  pounds  per  annum  to 
keep  him  at  St.  John's.  There's  a  long  vacation  of  four  months  in 
summer,  and  of  one  month  at  Christmas.  During  these  vacations  the 
student  either  studies  by  himself  or  joins  a  private  tutor,  and  boards 
somewhere  in  the  country.  The  tutor's  charge  is  ten  pounds  per 
month,  exclusive  of  board.  The  age  for  boys  entering  is  from  seven- 
teen to  twenty-one,  on  the  average  about  nineteen.  It  is  not  well  to  go 
too  young,  because  you  have  then  to  strive  for  honors  with  men 
much  older  and  of  more  experience  and  information.  Dined  at  Mr. 
De  Peyster's  with  Harriet  and  a  party,  it  being  the  anniversary  of 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  De  P.'s  wedding,  and  also  of  Emily's  and  Fred  Foster's 
wedding. 

"  November  20,  1845.  Called  with  Harriet  and  Mr.  and  Mrs.  De 
Peyster  on  the  Spencers  at  356  Broadway.  Then  Mrs.  De  P.  left 
cards  at  the  Thornes'.     Afterwards  Mr.  De  Peyster  and  I  went  to 

f  The  four  marked  thus  *  I  have  seen. 


78  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

the  Tombs,  the  jail  so-called,  built  in  the  Egyptian  style,  of  white 
granite.  Saw  the  recorder's  court  in  session,  with  Recorder  Tall- 
mage,  a  fine-looking  man,  on  the  bench.  Afterward  visited  the 
male  and  female  prisoners  in  their  wards  ;  there  was  apparently  no 
classification.  This  is  only  a  receiving  prison,  except  in  special 
cases,  as  in  that  of  Babe  the  pirate,  whom  we  saw.  He  has  been 
respited  from  death  year  after  year.  He  is  a  bad,  coarse-looking 
young  man,  with  a  whitey-brown  complexion,  petty-looking  face, 
and  thick  neck.  No  prison  dress  and  no  cropped  hair.  Prostitutes, 
although  making  no  disturbance,  are  arrested  and  sent  for  three  or 
four  months  to  Blackwell's  Island. 

"  Sunday,  November  23,  1845.  Went  to  the  North  Dutch  Church, 
Fulton  Street,  Harriet's  old  family  church,  where  her  father  was  an 
elder,  and  in  a  vault  outside  he  is  buried  ;  the  vault  belongs  to  the 
Kane  family.  There  was  an  immense  crowd  to  hear  the  Rev.  George 
Bethune  of  Philadelphia,  a  grandson  of  Mrs.  Isabella  Graham.  He 
has  a  look  of  Oliver  Cromwell  ;  was  disappointed  with  him  as  an 
orator.     Much  cry  and  little  wool. 

"Tuesday,  November  25,  1845.  Dined  with  Harriet  at  Mr.  W. 
H.  Russell's,  686  Broadway — a  farewell  dinner.  Miss  Emily  Moore, 
Mrs.  Van  den  Heuvel,  Miss  Russell,  and  Mr.  Draper  present — a 
pleasant  party  and  neat  dinner.  In  the  evening  we  went  to  John 
Hone's  and  met  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Fred.  De  Peyster,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  F. 
Foster,  Miss  Elizabeth  Jones,  Miss  Susan  Robinson  and  her  sister 
Mrs.  Jones,  Morris  Robinson,  and  two  Messrs.  Irving,  etc.,  also  a 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Leander  Starr,  Canadians,  I  think. 

"  Wednesday,  November  27,  1845.  Left  my  dear  wife  and  children 
at  the  New  York  Hotel  at  8.30  a.  m.  for  Philadelphia,  which  I  reached 
at  3  P.  M.  It  rained  heavily  most  of  the  way,  but  cleared  up  before 
we  got  to  Bristol  ;  from  thence  we  went  by  steamer  to  Philadelphia. 
There  I  was  met  by  Tom  Kane  and  dined  at  his  father's,  who  gave 
me  letters  of  introduction  to  President  Polk  and  the  Vice  President, 
and  also  to  Robert  J.  Walker,  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  and 
expressed  a  hope  that  I  would  see  and  talk  with  the  last  about  free 
trade.  These  letters  also  introduce  Tom  Sellar,  who  is  traveling 
with  me,  which  is  very  kind.  We  left  Philadelphia  at  4  p.  m.  and 
arrived  at  Baltimore  1  A.  m.,  November  28,  1845,  owing  to  detention 
on  the  road,  and  having  to  go  back  seven  miles  to  let  the  other  cars 


LAST  SUMMER  OF  MY  LIFE  WITH  HARRIET  IN  NEW  YORK.    79 

pass  us  ;  but  for  this  we  ought  to  have  reached  Baltimore  up,  m., 
November  27,  We  stopped  twice,  once  one  and  a  half  hours  after 
we  started  ;  got  excellent  oyster  soup  and  bad  coffee.  Then,  again, 
in  a  curious,  house-like  steamer  we  crossed  the  Susquehanna  and 
had  stewed  oysters,  coffee,  etc.  The  spitting  in  the  railway  car  was 
awful  ;  there  was  absolutely  a  certain  depth  of  tobacco  spittle  on 
the  ground.  Put  up  at  the  Exchange  Hotel,  which  was  very  com- 
fortable. Cold  morning,  but  very  clear  ;  comfortable  breakfast, 
excellent  black  tea,  and  fresh  butter.  Wrote  letter  No.  i  to  my 
dearest  Harriet,  found  her  note  to  me  last  night  and  Charlotte's 
hymns  this  morning." 

Before  copying  out  the  letter  from  Harriet  above  referred  to,  1 
shall  insert  here  two  interesting  notes  to  me,  giving  her  views  as  to 
remaining  in  the  United  States  or  returning  to  Liverpool  in  1845. 
They  were  written  in  New  Orleans  prior  to  our  leaving  that  city  in 
May,  1845,  and  ought  to  have  been  inserted  in  this  autobiography 
at  that  time,  but  were  accidentally  omitted.     The  first  is  entitled  : 

"  MY    VIEWS    AS    A    CHRISTIAN. 

"  I  think  in  remaining  in  America  we  place  ourselves  voluntarily 
in  a  post  of  danger  as  well  as  temptation.  This  feeling  of  unsettled- 
ness,  and  following  hard  after  certain  things  and  events  (exclusively 
worldly),  is  not  good  for  the  health  of  the  soul,  neither  is  it  for  the 
health  of  the  body.  The  mind  is  in  a  feverish  state,  looking 
eagerly  forward  to  this  month  and  that  month  as  the  period  of  some 
great  effort  to  be  made  ;  this  accomplished,  fresh  objects  are  in 
view — all  worldly,  all  tending  to  drive  our  thoughts  into  the  world 
and  from  God — though  hitherto,  through  his  great  mercy,  our  bodies 
have  suffered,  our  business  has  not  prospered,  and  our  separations 
have  been  painful  ;  so  that  has  driven  us  to  God,  though  the  cares  of 
the  world  have  tended  to  choke  the  Word,  and  we  are  still  in  mercy 
^"^diXedi  to  follow  on  in  things  spiritual — faint,  yet  pursuing.  If  we 
should  remain,  I  think  one  inducement  to  do  so  (cloak  it  as  we  may) 
would,  in  a  great  measure,  if  not  altogether,  be  covetousness,  which  is 
idolatry,  and  God  has  said  '  From  all  their  idols  will  I  cleanse  them,' 
and  we  wish  to  have  it  so,   yet  how  will  this  be  accomplished  ? 


80  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Through  much  tribulation,  I  fear.  Rather,  let  us  yield  our  idols  to 
God,  bring  forward  '  our  curious  books  and  burn  them,'  and  be  con- 
tent ^vith  such  things  as  we  have,  for  He  has  said  '  I  will  never  leave 
you  nor  forsake  you.'  We  have  Christian  friends  in  Liverpool,  a 
good  Christian  pastor,  and  neither  wj' health,  nor  Bessie's,  nor  Willie's, 
has  been  as  good  since  we  came  here.  Another  year  circumstances 
might  arise  to  separate  us  for  nearly  half  the  year  from  each  other 
if  we  remain,  a  sacrifice  dearly  purchased  by  seeing  some  more  of 
the  old  accounts  put  ship-shape  ;  and,  in  being  separated  for  so 
long  a  time.  Death  might  separate  us  forever,  and  thus,  in  hasting 
to  be  rich,  we  should  pierce  ourselves  through  with  many  sorrows. 
This,  of  course,  might  equally  occur  at  home,  but  we  should  then 
have  nothing  to  reproach  ourselves  with.  All  the  children  but  one 
earnestly  desire  to  feel  settled  at  home,  and  perhaps  the  very  desire 
that  this  one  has  to  go  wandering  about  is  the  very  reason  he  should 
go  home." 

"  MV    VIEWS    AS    A     MERCHANT.* 

"  Your  letter  leaves  it  entirely  optional  with  me  either  to  return 
home  or  to  remain  here  another  year.  I  would  have  been  better 
pleased  had  you  repeated  decidedly  your  former  wish  that  I  should 
at  all  events  return.  As  it  is,  I  have  been  completely  at  a  loss  what 
to  do.  There  is  evidently  so  much  to  be  done  that  the  necessity 
seems  as  urgent  as  ever  that  I  should  remain — yet  the  difficulty  lies 
in  this,  the  doing  what  is  to  be  done  is  not  left  entirely  with  me,  but 
now  that  the  visiting  of  planters  is  over  I  must  act  through  Mylne 
and  Murray  Thomson,  and  this  being  master  with  master,  the  task  is 
neither  an  easy  nor  a  pleasant  one.  I  have  therefore  concluded, 
after  much  deliberation,  that  I  had  better  return  to  my  old  post  at 
Liverpool,  and  trust  to  your  letters  from  the  other  side  doing  what 
my  counsels  and  presence  have  failed  to  do.  These  should  be 
strong  and  urgent  as  to  the  necessity  of  close  attention  to  the  old 
accounts." 

*  This  was  given  to  me  with  the  intention  of  my  embodying  it  in  a  letter  to 
Alex.  Dennistoun,  John  Dennistoun,  and  William  Cross. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

ON  MY  WAY  TO  NEW  ORLEANS,  DECEMBER,  1 845. 

The  following  series  of  letters  was  written  during  my  journey 
to,  residence  at,  and  return  from,  New  Orleans  in  1845-46  : 

The  first  of  these  letters  is  addressed  to  "  William  Wood,  Esq., 
Wanderer,  Face  of  the  Earth."  It  was  wrapped  in  my  nightshirt, 
and  found  when  I  reached  Baltimore,  where  I  slept  at  the  Exchange 
Hotel  the  first  night  from  home,  November  27,  1845. 

"  New  York,  November  26,  1845. 
"  My  Beloved  Husband  : 

"  Keep  up  your  spirits  for  my  sake  and  endeavor  even  to  enjoy 
this  jaunt,  and  I  will  promise  you  to  bear  up  as  much  as  I  can 
under  so  heavy  an  affliction,  for  I  know  how  necessary  it  is  that  I 
should  not  give  way  for  the  dear  children's  sake  and  my  own. 
Indeed  I  must  not  allow  myself  to  think,  or  wish,  that  you  had  not 
gone,  for  it  is  hard  enough  silently  to  endure,  even  from  moment  to 
moment — bearing  the  present  meekly  and  7iot  tooking  forward  to 
the  length  of  the  separation,  and  to  painful  possibilities  ;  and  you, 
dearest  Will,  must  do  the  same.  God  give  us  strength  and  courage 
to  submit  cheerfully  to  this  trial,  and  may  we  only  feel  it  in  so  far 
that  we  may  profit  by  it,  reflecting  that  the  time  must  come  when 
we  shall  be  separated  by  the  death  of  one  of  us.  May  we,  my  dar- 
ling, grow  in  grace,  and  in  the  knowledge  of  our  Lord  and  Saviour 
Jesus  Christ,  laying  up  treasure  in  heaven,  and  fearing  alway  lest 
the  cares  of  this  world  and  the  deceitfulness  of  riches  and  the  lust 
of  other  things  choke  the  Word  within  us. 

"Six  o'clock,  after  dinner.  Interrupted  at  3  p.  m.  by  Julia  Mills 
coming  in.  Mr.  Sellar's  words  have  given  me  great  hope,  and  per- 
haps if  you  find  you  can  be  equally  useful,  or  even  almost  as  useful, 
by  visiting  St.  Louis,  Louisville,  and  Cincinnati,  you  may  return 
here  by  March  i.     If  possible,  I  know  you  will  do  it.    In  the  mean- 


82  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

time   I  will  try  and  '  hope  on,  hope  ever,'  bearing  in  mind  these 
lines  : 

"  '  Strength  \s promised,  strength  is  given, 

When  by  grief  the  heart  is  riven, 

Bni  foredate  the  day  of  woe 

And  alone  thou  bearest  the  blow.' 

And  now,  my  darling,  farewell  for  a  time,  and  may  God's  peace 
rest  upon  us  both,  and  dwell  in  our  hearts  by  faith  in  our  blessed 
Redeemer,  and  oh,  may  he  unite  us  together  again  with  sound  minds 
and  sound  bodies,  before  your  oivn  appoiiited  time,  if  it  be  his  will. 
"  Your  own  devoted  wife, 

"H." 

"New  York,  November  26,  1845. 
"  Mv  Blessed   Harriet  : 

"  I  know  you  will  like  to  have  a  few  lines  after  I  leave  you,  if  it 
be  only  to  say  God  bless  you.  To  tell  you  hoxv  much  I  love  you  is 
impossible.  If  you  love  7fie  you  must  try  and  keep  up  your  spirits, 
not  only  for  my  sake,  but  for  that  of  our  dear  children.  I  wish 
you  to  write  to  me  on  Friday  ;  direct  your  letter  to  me,  'Post  Office, 
Washington,'  and  I  will  get  the  letter  on  Monday  morning.  You 
must  send  it  to  Mr.  Dawson,  124  Bleecker  Street,  on  Friday  night, 
and  he  will  send  it  off  on  Saturday.  The  next  time  you  should 
write  to  me  will  be  on  Thursday  week  ;  that  is,  send  the  letter  to  Mr. 
Dawson's  on  Thursday  evening,  December  4  ;  direct  it  '  Care  of 
Messrs.  Mitchell  &  Mure,  Charleston.'  I  will  write  to  you  on  the 
•way  where  your  third  letter  should  be  directed  to  me.  John  Walter 
•may  write  his  first  letter  on  Saturday  first,  and  you  can  inclose  it 
in  yours  to  Charleston.  I  will  write  on  the  road  where  Charlotte's 
first  letter  of  the  following  Saturday  is  to  be  sent. 

"I  have  given  you  a  note  of  my  assets.  If  you  should  live  after 
me,  I  don't  know  but  you  had  better  settle  here.  Get  Mr.  De 
Peyster  to  invest  your  money  in  bond  and  mortgage,  take  a  small 
house  and  educate  the  children  as  well  as  you  can,  bring  them  up 
in  the  fear  of  God,  and  may  he  watch  over  you  and  them.  Pray 
for  direction  as  to  John  Walter's  profession.  /  think  that  of  a 
lawyer  might  be  the  best.  I  hope,  however,  I  may  be  spared  to 
come  back  to  you,  and  find   you  and  all  my  children  well.     God 


ON  MY  WAY  TO  NEW  ORLEANS,  DECEMBER,  1 845.   83 

Almighty  bless  you  and  them,  and  may  he  watch  over  us  all,  and 
unite  us  again  in  health  and  happiness.  And  oh,  may  he  enable 
us  to  live  more  to  God  and  to  bring  every  thought  in  subjection  to 
Christ.  Do  not  give  way  to  grief,  my  beloved  one,  '  put  a  cheerful 
courage  on,'  and  trust  the  Lord  and  pray  for  me. 

"  If  you  write  to  England,  your  letters  must  be  sent  to  Mr. 
Dawson's  on  Friday  evening.  I  write  in  haste,  amid  talking  and 
business,  and  would  write  more,  but  I  know  you  would  rather  have 
my  bodily  presence  with  you  than  a  longer  letter. 

"  Ever  your  own  attached  husband, 

"  William  Wood." 

The  memorandum  of  my  assets  referred  to  above  is  as  follows  : 

;/^3500  insured  on  my  life  and  settled  on  Harriet's  trustees. 

;;^4000  or  p^sooo  settled  on  her  trustees  as  per  deed  of  trust ;  something  to 

be  added  in   case  of  Eliza's  death  before  she  marries,  say  ;i{^7000  or 

;^8ooo  ;  not  liable  for  my  debts. 
;!^2000  insured  on  my  life  ;    liable  for  my  debts, 
;^20oo,  a  moderate   valuation  for   house  and  furniture  at  Liverpool  ;  my 

box  of  silver  plate  is  in  Royal  Bank,  Liverpool  ;   liable  for  ray  debts. 
;!fi200,  I  fancy,  may  be  the  value  of  my  share  in  the  Clyde  Co.;    liable 

for  my  debts. 
;^Soo,  say,  due  from  my   underwriting,   Liverpool  ;    liable  for  my  debts, 

which  may  be  that  amount  or  more. 
;^6ooo,  house   at  Elie,   settled   on   John   Walter,  but   with   life  rent  to 

Harriet. 

"  New  York  Hotel,  New  York, 

"  November  27  and  28,  1845. 
""  Mv  Precious  William  : 

"  I  have  waited  till  late  before  beginning  my  letter,  that  I  may  tell 
you  at  the  last  moment  how  we  all  are,  and  now  I  fear  every  minute 
will  bring  someone  upon  me  to  interrupt  me. 

"  Yesterday  was  a  day  of  intense  sorrow  to  me,  a  feeling  like  that 
when  the  dead  have  left  the  house,  a  vacant  stillness  is  felt 
throughout  the  deserted  rooms,  and  a  horror  of  deep  gloom.  Not 
a  soul  looked  near  me,  man,  woman,  or  child.  The  children  all 
went  to  school,  except  the  little  ones,  and  my  head  was  so  painful  I 
could  not  bear  their  footsteps.  Maria  wrote  me  a  note  saying  her 
cold  was  so  bad  that  Mr.  De  Peyster  forbade  her  leaving  the  house. 


84  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

and  Julia  Mills,  who  came  before  on  a  wet  day,  never  came.  Nor  did 
John  Hone,  Mr.  De  Peyster,  nor  Charles  Winthrop,  though  I  did  not 
want  to  see  them,  yet  all  helped  to  make  it  seem  to  me  as  the  longest 
and  dreariest  day  I  had  ever  spent.  As  soon  as  you  left  I  walked 
up  and  down  with  my  children  till  they  were  obliged  to  go  to  school, 
then  read  my  Bible  (some  most  comforting  chapters),  and  prayed 
fervently  for  us  both,  and  felt  that  God  was  indeed  a  very  present 
help  in  time  of  trouble,  and  that  he  would  care  for  me  and  watch 
over  my  beloved  one,  who,  for  Christ's  sake,  was  precious  in  his 
sight.  I  then  went  to  work  and  helped  Powell  to  change  and 
arrange  the  children's  drawers  and  boxes,  and  felt,  in  busying  myself 
for  their  comfort,  I  was  attending  to  my  own.  Sometimes  I  stopped 
to  pray,  and  always  felt  comforted  ;  sometimes  to  weep,  and  felt 
relieved.  I  had  soon  the  rooms  in  complete  order — that  is,  by  two 
o'clock.  The  cot  in  my  room,  the  bureau  opposite  the  other  one, 
and  the  wardrobe  moved  nearer  the  door.  Your  portrait  hung  up 
on  the  little  nail  near  the  glass,  and  the  whole  room  looking  com- 
fortable and  snug.  I  could  not  read  anything  yet  but  my  precious, 
comforting  Bible  and  your  dear  letter,  which  was  read  six  or  seven 
times  that  day.  Did  you  get  mine  in  the  inside  of  your  nightshirt  ? 
About  three  I  began  to  read  De  Foe,  and  got  interested  in  it,  though 
with  a  leaden  weight  at  my  heart  ;  then  the  children  came  home, 
and  dinner  occupied  some  time.  Dear  Charlotte  behaved  like  a  little 
angel,  so  like  a  Christian,  and  so  tender  and  affectionate.  A  card 
for  Mrs.  B.  Neilson's  ball  for  December  9  came,  which  I  answered 
after  tea,  and  continued  my  reading  till  bedtime.  Read  the  evening 
Jay  aloud  and  three  Psalms  of  the  Bible  to  the  children.  Charlotte 
sang  '  Thy  will  be  done,'  and  I  took  them  to  my  own  room  and  we 
all  knelt  down  together  and  prayed  for  our  blessed  father,  friend, 
and  husband.  We  went  to  bed  about  ten.  I  awoke  about  four 
times  in  the  night,  and  prayed  for  my  darling  husband,  but  this  last 
time  I  must  have  been  half  asleep,  as  I  prayed  about  Zebedee,  and 
then  remembered  that  I  was  not  thinking  when  I  began,  but  praying. 
At  quarter  to  six  I  awoke,  lit  my  lamp  to  see  my  watch,  and  finding  it 
so  early  lay  down  again  till  quarter  to  seven,  was  dressed  by  quarter 
to  eight,  and  had  worship,  reading  one  of  Jay's  prayers,  which  I  had 
abridged,  and  the  continuation  of  Deuteronomy  and  Corinthians. 
The  weather  to-day  is   colder  than  we  have  yet  had  it  at  all.     You 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS,   DECEMBER,    1845.        ^S 

see  I  am  determined  to  get  and  keep  myself  well.  I  then  read  my 
Psalms  and  chapter  in  John's  Gospel,  went  to  my  own  room,  had  a 
comfortable  outpouring  of  heart  before  God,  and  taught  dear  Willie 
a  very  long  lesson  ;  he  was  very  attentive  and  very  bright.  I  told 
him  I  should  tell  you,  then  took  my  sewing,  and  Caroline  Neilson 
came  in  and  sat  with  me  till  twelve,  when  Maria  came.  She  had 
been  so  ill  as  to  make  her  get  up  and  sit  up  from  the  oppression  of 
breathing.  To-day  she  is  better,  and  is  coming  here  again  this 
evening,  which  is  the  reason  I  am  writing  for  dear  life  lest  I  have  to 
cut  short  my  letter.  Julia  Mills  just  came  in,  but  had  the  sense  to 
go  off,  seeing  me  writing  ;  says  she  will  come  to-morrow  ;  and  a 
washerwoman  came  in  with  a  note  from  Sallie  Morris,  recommend- 
ing her,  and  the  children  have  interrupted  me  several  times.  Soon 
after  Maria  came  Emily  came,  and  then  came  Mrs.  Isaac  Hone,  but 
I  went  to  my  bedroom,  as  I  did  not  feel  able  to  see  her.  Caroline 
Neilson  stayed  with  me  till  after  they  had  all  gone,  and  then  insisted 
on  my  coming  up  to  her  house  for  a  walk  ;  she  was  most  affectionate 
and  tender.  Dear  Maria  also  was  everything  that  was  lovely,  but 
she  had  to  pay  these  calls  with  Mrs.  Isaac  Hone.  Eliza  Kane  also 
was  here,  but  I  did  not  see  her.  Maria  insisted  on  my  coming  to- 
morrow with  all  the  four  children  to  spend  the  day  and  dine  with 
her,  and  I  insisted  as  hard  that  I  could  not,  for  I  do  not  feel  able  to 
speak  to  Mr.  Foster  and  Mr.  De  Peyster,  but  I  have  promised  to  go 
up  early  there  to-morrow  about  eleven  and  take  a  drive  with  her  in 
the  country,  and  meet  Caroline  Neilson  there  at  two  o'clock,  bring- 
ing all  the  children.  I  have  got  a  card  for  us  to  Mrs.  Colden's  ball 
on  December  5.  Will  you  go  ?  God  bless  you,  my  too  tenderly 
beloved  husband.  I  never  loved  you  so  much  as  now,  and  never 
felt  your  absence  more,  but,  thank  God,  I  feel  his  presence  and 
have  an  inward  peace  which  passeth  understanding.  May  you  have 
the  same,  my  own  blessed  husband.     Remember  me  kindly  to  Sellar. 

"  Ever  thine, 

"H." 

"  Exchange  Hotel,  Baltimore,  November  2S,  1845. 
'*  My  Beloved  Wife  : 

"  Mr.  De  Peyster  would  tell  you  of  our  embarkation  in  the  rain, 
and  that  I  was  in  wonderfully  good  spirits,  considering.     I  parted 


86  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

with  him  at  Jersey  City.     Sellar  and  I  took  our  seats  in  the  rail  cars. 

1  immediately  began  to  read  about  Oregon  in  the  Journal  of  Com- 
tnerce,  which  occupied  me  nearly  two  hours,  but  at  one  o'clock  I 
prayed  with  you  as  we  had  agreed  to  do,  and  I  trust  our  petitions 
ascended  together  to  the  Throne  of  Grace  and  found  acceptance 
through  the  Beloved. 

''After  finishing  the  paper  on  Oregon,  I  began  the  article  on 
De  Foe  in  the  Edinburgh  Revieiu,  and  kept  reading  at  it  until  we 
reached  Bristol,  by  which  time,  by  the  way,  the  rain  had  ceased. 
There  we  got  into  a  steamer  and  steamed  down  the  Delaware  sixteen 
or  eighteen  miles  to  Philadelphia.  I  expected  to  have  gone  on  to 
Camden,  opposite  Philadelphia,  and  then  just  have  crossed  the  ferry, 
but  this  I  did  not  do,  but  went  the  same  route  as  I  had  gone  in 
summer.  We  dined  on  board  the  steamer,  and  had  a  very  comfort- 
able dinner.  At  Philadelphia  Tom  Kane  was  waiting  for  us  on  the 
wharf,  and  insisted  on  us  both  going  to  dine  at  his  father's.  I  went, 
but  Tom  Sellar  remained  at  the  railway  station  to  look  after  the 
baggage.  We  were  about  an  hour  in  Philadelphia,  and  I  was  most 
hospitably  welcomed  by  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Kane  and  all  the  family,  and 
did  my  best  to  partake  of  this  second  dinner.  I  left  them  and  got 
into  the  rail  car  at  4  p.  m.,  Tom  Kane  going  to  see  me  off.  He  gave 
me  a  packet  directed  to  me,  containing  letters  of  introduction,  he 
said.  On  opening  this  I  found  letters  addressed  to  '  The  President,' 
'The  Vice  President,'  'Honorable  R.  J.  Walker,  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury,'  and  not  only  introducing  me,  but  also  Sellar,  which  I 
thought  was  very  kind.  We  had  a  very  long,  wearisome  time  of  it 
from  Philadelphia  to  Baltimore,  and  did  not  arrive  until  after  one 
o'clock  this  morning,  instead  of  at  eleven  last  night,  and  then  we 
had  to  wait  an  hour  before  we  got  our  baggage,  so  that  it  was  after 

2  A.  M.  before  I  got  to  bed.  I  had,  however,  a  very  comfortable 
bed  and  capital  sleep.  I  was  up  at  half-past  seven,  and  have  had 
a  capital  breakfast.  I  have  not  seen  Tom  Sellar  this  morning,  and 
fancy  he  is  taking  it  easy  and  his  breakfast  in  bed. 

"When  taking  out  my  nightshirt  last  night,  or  rather  this  morn- 
ing, out  fell  your  dear  little  cheering  and  cheerful  note,  it  made  me 
smile,. and  I  went  to  bed  full  of  thankfulness  and  cheerfulness.  By 
the  way,  the  rail  car  I  was  in  from  Philadelphia  here  was  very  dirty, 
and  so  crowded  that  a  good  many  passengers  had  to  stand  for  fifty 


ON  MY  WAY  TO  NEW  ORLEANS,  DECEMBER,  1 845.   8/ 

miles.  Sellar  and  I  were  fortunate  in  getting  seats.  Last  night  and 
this  morning  before  I  got  up  I  was  wondering  what '  onder  arth  ' 
dear  Charlotte  could  have  been  doing  the  night  before  I  left,  for  I 
thought  she  was  writing  me  a  letter  or  something,  and  as  I  found 
none,  I  began  to  think  it  was  too  bad,  her  sitting  in  the  nursery  all 
that  evening.  But  after  breakfast  I  came  up  to  my  own  room  to  write 
to  you,  and  opened  my  American  Traveler,  and  out  dropped  my 
dear  little  child's  '  Diamonds  and  Pearls,'  God  bless  her!  I  read  every 
word  through  before  I  began  this  letter,  and  she  could  not  have 
given  rae  a  more  acceptable  gift,  or  '  Shewn  unto  me  a  more  excel- 
lent way.' 

"  I  hope,  my  darling  wife,  you  are  keeping  up  your  spirits  ;  I  am 
absolutely  surprised  at  the  goodness  of  mine.  The  weather  became 
excessively  cold  last  evening  and  continues  so,  but  the  atmosphere 
is  clear  and  bracing.  However,  it  is  somewhat  of  a  labor  of  love 
sitting  in  this  bedroom  without  a  fire,  and  my  hands  quite  blue  with 
cold,  so  I  will  take  a  spell  at  Jay,  and  warm  my  hands  in  my 
pockets.  The  Jay  is  a  very  good  one  on,  *  Be  thou  in  the  fear  of  the 
Lord  all  the  day  long.'  Say  that  from  me  to  my  dear  John  Walter, 
whose  pale  face  I  have  before  me  now  as  he  stood  at  the  door  of  the 
New  York  Hotel — and  talking  of  hotels,  it  is  a  great  shame  you  don't 
get  better  butter.  I  had  excellent  fresh  butter  here  this  morning.  I 
wish  when  Captain  Comstock  comes,  Mr.  De  Peyster  would  ask  Mr. 
Morgan,  the  real  owner,  to  give  a  hint  to  Comstock  to  be  attentive 
to  you  ;  I  am  sure  that  would  do  good.  I  have  just  seen  Tom 
Sellar  ;  he  has  not  breakfasted  yet,  half  past  nine,  and  slept  ill.  I  slept 
famously.  Then  Jay  to-day  quotes  the  text  Proverbs  33  and  17th 
verse.  Now,  there  are  only  thirty-one  chapters  in  Proverbs,  and  the 
seventeenth  chapter  has  not  thirty-three  verses. 

"I  read  one  chapter  of  John  to-day,  and  the  ist  Psalm.  God 
bless  you,  my  blessed  Harriet,  give  my  warmest  love  to  John  Walter, 
Charlotte,  Bessie,  Harriet,  and  Willie,  and  kiss  little  sweet  *  Pee- 
torosey  '  for  me.  I  think  of  you  and  them  all,  and  love  you  most 
dearly.  Remember  me  kindly  to  Powell,  and  give  my  best  love  to 
Maria  and  Mr.  De  P.  I  intend  to  write  you  from  Washington  on 
Sunday,  and  I  suppose  you  will  get  the  letter  on  Tuesday.  We 
leave  for  Washington  to-night  at  five  o'clock.  After  I  write 
some  business   letters,  I    am    going    out    to    see   Baltimore.     The 


88  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

Kanes  spoke  of  J.  Walter's  visit,  and  still  wish  Charlotte  to  accom- 
pany him. 

"  Ever  your  own  attached  husband, 

"  William  Wood." 

"  No  10,  Coleman's  National  Hotel, 

"Washington,  November  29,  1845. 
"  Mv  Blessed  Harriet  : 

"  I  wrote  to  you  yesterday  from  Baltimore.  After  closing  my 
letter  I  made  two  business  calls,  and  then  went  to  the  Catholic 
cathedral,  where  you  and  I  went  and  saw  the  two  paintings  presented 
by  Louis  XVHI.  and  Charles  X.,  which,  I  suppose  from  my  taste 
being  improved  by  a  greater  experience,  I  did  not  think  so  much  of 
as  at  my  last  visit.  We  also  saw  the  monument  to  Washington,  and 
the  monument  to  those  who  fell  at  the  battle  of  North  Point,  where 
you  recollect  Mr.  May  Humphreys  was,  and  amused  us  all  by  an 
account  of  his  sensations  as  he  saw  the  British  red  line  appearing. 
Baltimore  lies  on  ground  ascending  pretty  steeply  from  the  water, 
and  is  a  cheerful  place,  the  men  well  dressed,  and  the  women  pretty 
and  lively  looking.  Sellar  called  on  a  Miss  Macteth  and  was  well 
received  and  highly  pleased.  Yesterday  there  was  hard  frost  and 
bitter  cold.  We  left  for  Washington  by  railway  at  5  p.  m.  The  cars 
very  full,  and  although  the  distance  is  thirty-seven  miles  only,  we 
did  not  arrive  till  8  p.  m.  This  hotel  is  the  one  formerly  kept  by 
Gadsby,  and  is  a  comfortable  enough  one.  You  recollect  you  and 
I  were  here.  My  room  is,  I  think,  just  in  the  story  above  the  room 
we  had,  or  else  directly  opposite.  '  Do  you  remember,  love  ? '  '  The 
place  is  so  lovely,'  and  the  beautiful  vision  I  saw?  'Teach,  oh! 
teach  me  to  forget.'  My  room  is  about  the  size  of  John  Walter's 
in  the  New  York  Hotel,  and  you  get  to  it,  like  all  the  rest,  by  an 
outside  gallery,  which  in  this  bitter  cold  weather  is  not  agreeable. 
However,  I  slept  well  last  night,  and  to-day  I  have  a  fire,  which 
at  the  present  is  roasting,  and  I  am  forced  to  retreat  into  the  farthest 
corner  of  the  room,  as  it  is  of  anthracite  and  scorching.  The 
weather  has  been  most  bitterly  and  detestably  cold  all  day,  but  a 
little  snow  has  fallen  in  the  afternoon,  and  rather  tempered  the 
atmosphere. 

"  After  breakfast  Sellar  and  I  went  to  the  Capitol,   and  to  the 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS,   DECEMBER,    1 845.        89 

paintings  which  were  there  in  the  Rotunda  fifteen  years  ago  are 
added  the  Baptism  of  Pocahontas,  and  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  at  Worship 
on  Board  Ship.  We  saw  the  Senate  Chamber  and  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives, neither  of  which  struck  me  so  much  as  they  did  before. 
The  Capitol  is  a  fine  building,  but  the  dome  is  out  of  propor- 
tion large.  Washington  itself  is  a  miserable  place,  and  it  must 
take  a  good  deal  of  honor  and  pay  to  make  it  endurable. 
Pennsylvania  Avenue  is  the  main  street,  and  it  is  handsome 
from  being  broad,  and  having  the  Capitol  at  one  end  and 
the  White  House  (the  President's  residence)  nearly  at  the  other  ; 
but  it  has  no  fine  buildings  in  it.  The  Post  Office  and  Patent  Office 
are  fine  buildings,  so  that  you  may  say  there  are  just  four  fine  build- 
ings in  Washington.  We  called  on  Foster's  friend,  Mr.  Riggs,  and 
then  went  to  the  White  House,  but  were  told  the  President  was 
attending  a  cabinet  council,  and  would  not  be  disengaged  for  two 
hours  ;  but  we  looked  at  the  public  rooms,  and  in  the  dining  room 
saw  the  deal  dining  table  used  by  Jefferson,  and  still  used  by  the 
President  when  he  gives  dinners  to  the  Congressmen,  but  there  was 
a  strong  contrast  to  it  in  the  chairs,  which  were  handsome  rosewood, 
covered  with  violet-colored  velvet.  There  was  also  an  old,  but  rather 
handsome,  mahogany  sideboard  which  had  belonged  to  Washington. 
We  then  went  to  the  Patent  Office,  where  we  saw  many  interesting 
curiosities  and  also  several  gimcracks.  We  saw  the  original  Decla- 
ration of  Independence,  and  had  pointed  out  to  us  where  it  had 
been  begun  wrong,  and  badly  engrossed  by  one  hand,  and  afterwards 
properly  begun  and  finished  by  another  hand,  but  they  could  not 
have  it  all  executed  by  the  good  hand,  because  another  sheet  of 
parchment  of  the  same  size  could  not  be  got  in  the  country  at  the 
time. 

"The  United  States  Government  has  at  the  Smithsonian 
Washington's  coat,  waistcoat,  and  breeches  on  exhibition,  which  is 
of  a  piece  with  England's  keeping  Nelson's  coat,  etc.,  at  Westminster 
Abbey,  and  Sir  Walter's  at  Abbotsford,  showing  that  mother  and 
daughter  have  the  same  tastes  in  relics,  and  that,  a  questionable  one, 
reminding  one  too  much  of  '  old  clo'.' 

"After  this  we  returned  again  to  the  White  House,  and  the  Presi- 
dent being  still  engaged  at  the  council,  we  were  ushered  into  a  room, 
and  the  black  servant  brought  us  some  newspapers,  among  which  I 


go  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

was  pleased  to  see  the  League  zxid  Economist  of  October  i8,  1845  ; 
mention  this  to  Foster  with  my  respects.  After  a  little  the  servant 
came  and  said  the  President  was  ready  to  receive  us.  We  were 
then  ushered  into  a  sort  of  library,  with  two  tables  covered  with 
books,  and  plainly  furnished.  In  about  a  minute  another  door 
opened,  from  that  by  which  we  entered,  and  a  moderate-sized  man 
appeared,  whom  I  knew  at  once,  by  his  resemblance  to  the  portraits^ 
to  be  James  K.  Polk.  I  walked  up  and  shook  hands,  introduced 
Sellar,  and  gave  the  President  Mr.  Kane's  letter,  which  he  read,  and 
then  we  had  a  '  twa-handed  crack'  about  Indian  corn,  free  trade, 
etc.,  etc.  Mr.  Polk  said,  *  All  restrictions  on  both  sides  are  bad.' 
He  talked  a  great  deal  about  Indian  corn,  how  cheaply  it  could  be 
grown  and  what  excellent  food  it  was  ;  that  even  '  here,'  he  himself 
ate  nothing  else  for  bread  ;  that  the  valley  of  the  Mississippi  could 
grow  enough  to  feed  all  Europe,  with  its  surplus  ;  that  if  our  ports 
were  opened  they  could  feed  '  the  starving  population  of  England.' 
The  epithet  starving  rather  stuck  in  Tom  Sellar's  gizzard.  James 
Knox  Polk  is  a  plain,  unassuming  man,  with  grizzled  hair,  rather 
short,  thin,  and  careworn-looking,  with  his  hair  brushed  back  like 
Jackson's,  somev;hat  '  dour '  looking,  and  I  doubt  not  would  go  to 
war  rather  than  give  up  an  inch  of  Oregon,  once  having  made  up 
his  mind  that  it  belonged  to  this  country.  He  looked  like  a  respect- 
able undertaker. 

"I  got  him  on  his  family,  and  he  told  me  his  father's  ancestors 
were  from  Scotland,  but  emigrated  to  the  north  of  Ireland,  and  from 
thence  to  the  east  coast  of  Maryland,  where  they  landed  125  years 
ago,  and  finally  moved  to  Tennessee.  It  must  be  all  nonsense  about 
Ferguson  Carter  being  his  second  cousin.  His  mother  is  a  descend- 
ant of  John  Knox,  and  she  has  a  snuffbox  made  out  of  Knox's 
pulpit.  I  have  in  my  journal  a  more  minute  account  of  my  inter- 
view and  conversation  with  the  President,  but  I  dare  say  you  have 
got  enough  of  it.  I  have  not  yet  called  on  Mr.  Dallas,  the  Vice 
President.  I  believe  he  is  in  this  hotel.  I  called  twice  on  Mr.  R.  J. 
Walker,  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  but  he  was  out, 

"  Mr.  John  Slidell  has  not  arrived  here.  Mr.  Campbell,  Mr.  De 
Peyster's  friend,  is  in  this  hotel,  but  I  have  not  yet  got  hold  of  him 
to  deliver  the  letter  of  introduction  to  him.  It  is  now  9  p.  M.,  and  I 
shall  say  good-night,  and  God  bless  you  and  my  dear  children,  my 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS,   DECEMBER,    1 845.        9 1 

darling  one.  When  one  thinks  of  it,  it  is  something  to  have  talked 
so  sociably  with  the  man  who,  on  Monday  or  Tuesday,  may  deliver  a 
message  which  may  lead  to  a  general  war,  and  who  may  have  been 
giving  the  last  finishing  touch  to  that  message  at  the  very  cabinet 
council  held  to-day  while  Tom  Sellar  and  I  were  reading  the  news- 
papers in  a  room  of  the  very  house  where  it  was  held. 

"  Sunday,  November  30,  1845.  I  have  just  returned  from  church 
whither  I  went  with  Mr.  William  W.  Campbell,  a  member  of  Con- 
gress, to  whom  Mr.  De  Peyster  gave  me  a  letter,  and  who  is  a  pleas- 
ant, intelligent  man.  Sellar  went  with  us.  We  heard  a  Dr.  Laurie, 
a  Presbyterian,  and  father  of  a  Dr.  Laurie  whom  I  met  in  Arkansas, 
and  who  you  may  recollect  surprised  me  by  quoting  Tennyson.  The 
father  is  a  hard-headed  old  Scotsman,  not  unlike  my  Grandfather 
Dennistoun,  and  gave  us  a  sort  of  Nebuchadnezzar  sermon  of 
commonplaces.  But  he  seemed  to  have  a  sort  of  dry  humor,  for  in 
reference  to  a  collection  taken  up  to  supply  fuel,  he  said  on  the  day 
of  the  previous  collection  the  weather  was  so  inclement  that  the 
congregation  was  very  small,  and  the  collection  was  in  conformity. 
And  again  in  reference  to  the  prayer  meeting  to  be  held  on  Tuesday, 
he  hoped  the  congregation  would  bear  in  mind  that  prayer  meetings 
were  not  instituted  solely  for  the  benefit  of  the  pastors,  and  would, 
therefore,  be  more  constant  in  their  attendance  than  they  had 
hitherto  been, 

"  I  have  not  yet  decided  whether  to  leave  this  to-morrow  night  or 
Tuesday  night,  but  unless  I  find  more  strong  inducement  to  stay,I  shall 
start  to-morrow  night  ;  that  is,  go  on  board  the  steamer,  for  it  does 
not  start  till  3  a.  m.  It  takes  us  to  a  place  called  Acquia  Creek,  on 
the  Potomac,  and  there  we  get  on  the  railway,  which  takes  us  to 
Richmond.  I  fancy  the  creek  is  about  thirty  or  forty  miles  below 
this.  I  hope  to  receive  a  letter  from  you  to-morrow.  God  grant  it 
bring  me  good  news  of  you.  I  have  read  the  Bible  and  Jay  to-day. 
I  don't  think  I  will  take  a  spell  at  *  Goode's  Better  Covenant ' 
until  I  reach  New  Orleans  ;  I  may  do  so,  however,  this  evening, 
when  I  intend  also  to  read  my  dear  little  Charlotte's  hymns.  We 
dine  in  this  hotel  at  two  o'clock  on  Sunday,  and  the  mail  leaves  for 
New  York  at  3.30  p.  m.  It  is  now  half  past  one,  and  I  am  just 
going  to  wash  my  hands  before  dinner.  I  have  been  reading  a 
part    of   the    first    article    in    the    Quarterly,   entitled:    'Religious 


92..  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

Controversy  in  France,'  which  is  well  written,  and  I  think  by 
W,  E.  Gladstone.  I  suppose  you  will  be  taking  your  dinner  to-day 
at  two  o'clock  also,  now  that  the  governor  is  on  his  travels. 
The  weather  here  is  still  cold,  and  snow  on  the  ground,  but  I 
think  there  are  symptoms  of  thaw  this  afternoon.  God  bless  you, 
my  beloved  wife,  and  all  my  dear  ones,  John  Walter  and  Char- 
lotte and  little  round-faced  Bessie  and  Harriet,  and  dear  simple- 
hearted  Willie  and  '  Ninny,  ninny,  nursery,  ne,'  how  I  love  you, 
and  each  and  all  of  them.  God  grant  we  may  soon  be  restored 
to  each  other,  in  health  of  body  and  mind,  and  meanwhile  may 
all  of  us  grow  in  grace  and  in  the  knowledge  of  our  Lord  and 
Saviour  Jesus  Christ. 

"  Ever  your  attached  husband, 

"  William  Wood." 

"  New  York  Hotel,  Sunday,  November  30,  1845,  after  church. 
"  My  Beloved  William  : 

"  Ten  thousand  thanks  for  your  unexpected  and  cheering  letter 
No.  I  from  Baltimore.  What  shall  we  render  unto  the  Lord  for  all 
his  benefits  unto  us  ?  Surely  '  he  has  borne  our  griefs  and  carried 
our  sorrows,'  and  let  us,  dear  Will,  dedicate  ourselves  afresh  to  his 
service,  and  no  longer  be  barren  and  unfruitful  in  the  work  of  the 
Lord,  but  be  daily  inquiring,  and  from  moment  to  moment,  '  Lord, 
what  wilt  thou  have  me  to  do  ? '  And  in  the  midst  of  all  your  busi- 
ness duties  let  your  religion  be  seen  and  felt.  Give  cheerfully  when 
you  have  an  opportunity,  as  God  has  prospered  you,  and  do  not  let 
Satan  delude  you  by  saying  you  have  '  nothing  to  give.'  God  '  has 
not  prospered  you,'  but  remember  the  widow's  mite,  and  give 
according  to  your  ability,  knowing  that  his  eyes  are  upon  us,  watch- 
ing the  amount  which  we  cast  into  his  treasury,  and  let  us  not  only 
be  cheerful  givers  of  our  money,  but  let  us  give  our  time,  such  as  we 
may  lawfully  give  from  our  business  and  our  duty,  to  our  fellow-men. 
Surely  God  requires  it  as  an  expression  of  our  gratitude  to  him  for 
all  his  mercies.  We  ought  indeed  to  do  more  for  him  and  for  his 
people.  You  can  be  gathering  information  which  may  be  useful  to 
others  when  you  go  home,  and  endeavor  to  lend  a  helping  hand 
when  any  reformation  is  needed,  and  remember  that  now  is  the 
time  to  work,  when  God  has  given  you  excellent  health  of  body  and 


ON  MY  WAY  TO  NEW  ORLEANS,  DECEMBER,  1 845.   93 

a  sound  and  cheerful  mind,  not  to  work  only  in  your  business  call- 
ing— there  you  are  ever  ready  and  sometimes  ^z;^r-diligent — but  to 
do  something  for  God  and  something  that  may  tell  after  you  are 
laid  to  rest.  What  record  shall  we  leave  of  the  time  that  is  passing 
so  swiftly  !  The  day  set  for  your  starting  on  this  journey  once 
seemed  so  far  away,  but  day  after  day  and  month  after  month 
passed  rapidly,  and  it  has  come  and  gone.  Now  we  look  forward  to 
the  distant  period  of  your  return  ;  that  also  will  certainly  come  if 
life  be  spared.  And  just  as  certainly  is  there  a  time  fixed  for  us  to 
leave  this  world  and  pass  to  our  Father's  house,  and,  although  we 
know  not  the  day,  we  are  just  as  certainly  getting  on  our  way  toward 
it,  nearer  and  nearer,  just  as  you,  my  beloved  one,  are  going  from 
stage  to  stage  nearer  and  nearer  to  New  Orleans.  Let  us  then  pray 
earnestly  to  God  that  we  '  may  pass  the  time  of  our  sojourning  here  in 
fear,  redeeming  the  time.'  My  health  has  been  excellent  since  you 
left,  except  the  one  day's  sick  headache,  and  all  the  children  and 
Powell  are  well,  and,  like  you,  I  have  wondered  at  my  calm  and 
cheerful  mind. 

"  On  Friday  evening  Emily  and  Foster,  Charles  and  Anna,  and 
Maria  and  De  Peyster  were  here.  Yesterday  I  took  the  three  girls 
and  went  to  Maria's  early  ;  the  day  was  so  bitterly  cold  that  we  did 
not  go  to  the  country  for  a  drive,  but  I  went  with  Maria  down  town 
and  purchased  a  muff  for  myself,  and  one  for  Charlotte,  both  costing 
ten  dollars  ;  mine  was  six  dollars,  and  a  very  nice  one.  By  this 
arrangement  Helen  can  get  Harriet's  muff,  for  I  see  that  to  do  with- 
out all  winter  would  be  next  to  impossible.  I  also  purchased  long 
stockings  for  Charlotte,  and  called  at  Mrs.  Okill's.  Margaret  Hone, 
Cassy,  and  the  Millses  were  here  in  my  absence.  To-day  it  is 
snowing  and  very  cold,  but  we  all  went  to  church.  Little  Willie 
behaved  like  a  little  old  man,  listening  all  the  time,  and  at  prayer 
covering  his  eyes  with  his  little  hands.  I  sat  between  him  and  Har- 
riet at  the  head  of  the  pew.  The  sermon  was  most  excellent,  one 
full  of  praise  to  God  and  thanksgiving,  in  which  I  and  my  children 
heartily  joined.  I  will  not  fill  my  letter  with  its  subject,  as  I  must 
leave  room  to  tell  you  all  the  news  from  this  till  Thursday,  which  is 
the  day  appointed  for  Thanksgiving. 

"  We  dine  to-day  at  three  o'clock,  and  Powell  goes  to  church. 
My  heart  is  so  full  of  love  to  you  and  yearning  to  see  you  that  I 


94  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

could  not  refrain  from  writing.  Your  sweet  face  has  been  so  cheer- 
ful that  your  miniature  is  less  agreeable  to  me  than  formerly,  and  in 
looking  at  it  I  pass  my  eyes  rapidly  from  the  grim  face  to  the  dear 
figure,  which  is  to  the  life,  while  I  have  in  my  heart  of  hearts  a 
more  delightful  picture  of  you,  as  you  sat  on  that  chair  opposite 
mine  in  my  bedroom  window,  with  your  head  boAved  down  over 
the  weekly  bill,  rectifying  some  error  you  discovered.  Oh,  how  my 
heart  glows  with  gratitude  to  God  for  all  his  mercies  to  you  and  to 
me  !     Farewell  for  the  present,  my  beloved  one. 

"Thursday,  December  4,  1845.  Well,  love,  hoping  you  have 
recovered  from  the  effects  of  your  Sunday's  sermon  from  me,  which, 
I  am  free  to  confess,  is  as  grim  as  your  dear  miniature,  I  resume  my 
pen.  Since  I  last  wrote  to  you  I  have  received  your  two  delightful 
letters  from  Washington,  November  29  and  30,  and  one  December  i. 
Mr.  Dawson  called  in  the  evening  and  brought  me  your  letter  of 
30th, — his  wife  had  called  previously, — and  the  one  of  December  i 
he  sent  about  eight  in  the  evening.  That  of  same  date  directed  to 
the  hotel  did  not  arrive  till  between  eleven  and  twelve  next  day.  I 
am  grieved  that  you  have  a  touch  of  your  old  complaint,  but  am 
obliged  to  you,  and  feel  that  I  can  trust  you  now  in  being  so  faithful 
as  to  conceal  nothing  from  me. 

"  It  is  now  one  o'clock,  and  at  two  I  am  going  to  Maria's  to  spend 
the  day,  she  sending  the  carriage  for  us,  the  three  elder  children  and 
myself.  Poor  wee  Harriet  I  leave  at  home  ;  Jane  and  John,  and 
Belle  Perry  (Bessie's  friend)  and  her  aunt,  who  are  staying  with  Jane, 
are  to  be  there,  and  also  Muller.  We  are  also  going  to  dine  there 
on  Christmas  Day.  Mr.  De  Peyster  and  Maria  insist  upon  it  ;  they 
were  quite  hurt  (really)  at  my  persisting  in  not  coming  every  Satur- 
day to  dine,  and  bringing  all  the  children  ;  but  I  would  rather  not  go 
so  often,  and  they  are  quite  reconciled  to  it  now.  I  keep  quite 
cheerful  at  home,  and  love  to  be  with  my  children,  all  of  them,  and 
alone.  I  have  had  an  invitation  to-day  to  the  Millses',  also  to  meet 
Mrs.  Minton,  and  a  general  one  again  from  the  Philip  Hones.  I 
could  not  go  to  church  to-day,  as  it  began  to  rain  on  the  top  of  the 
snow,  and,  though  not  so  cold,  it  has  made  dreadful  walking. 

"  W.  Forsyth  is  now  in  town  ;  he  called  here  yesterday,  and  I  am 
sending  up  by  him  a  five-dollar  gold  piece  to  Mary  Smyth  as  a  Christ- 
mas gift.    Have  I  done  right  ?    Maria  asked  me  what  money  I  had  in 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS,   DECEMBER,    1 845.        95 

the  house,  and  told  me  not  to  keep  too  much,  as  she  thought  very 
small  sums  would  be  safer  to  have  in  the  hotel,  the  servants 
knowing  I  was  alone  and  would  likely  have  money  to  pay  my  weekly 
bills.  I  then  told  her  tvhat  you  had  given  me,  and  she  begged  me, 
after  consulting  Mr.  De  Peyster,  to  let  her  keep  it,  and  gave  me  a 
receipt  for  it,  I  getting  from  her  what  I  want.  I  gave  her  $150. 
Did  I  do  rightly  in  this  also?  Here  is  your  next  dear  letter  just 
come  up  by  Johnnie  Yuille  ;  I  must  stop  to  read  it.  Your  letter  is 
dated  December  2,  and,  I  thank  God,  written  in  excellent  spirits, 
and,  I  hope,  not  wholly  owing  to  the  champagne.  I  shall  read  the 
President's  Message  carefully  the  first  opportunity.  I  am  now  in  a 
hurry  to  dress.  The  telegraph  is  surely  most  wonderful.  But  don't 
get  too  radical — remember,  it  is  not  such  a  bad  government,  after  all, 
on  the  other  side  of  the  ocean.  I  am  very  glad  you  stayed  to  see 
the  House  open,  but  don't  now  much  like  to  have  you  go  further 
from  me  ;  there  is  a  comfort  in  being  only  a  day's  mail  off. 

"  Mr.  De  Peyster  paid  me  a  long  friendly  call  yesterday,  and  then 
told  me  (about  10  a.  m.)  the  contents  of  the  Message  ;  he  also  was 
pleased  with  it  ;  this  Message  must  have  been  received  here  on 
Tuesday.  It  is  curious  that  you  should  have  been  lying  awake  early 
on  Wednesday  ;  so  also  was  I.  I  woke  first  at  five  minutes  to  three, 
and  got  up  and  lighted  my  lamp  and  looked  at  my  watch.  I  then 
put  out  the  lamp  and  must  have  lain  till  near  morning  ivide  awake.  I 
don't  know  what  disturbed  me  last  night  ;  I  slept  well  all  night 
through.  We  have  just  such  weather  as  you  have  had  Sunday — 
snow  and  very  cold  in  the  morning,  thaw  and  rain  in  the  afternoon, 
and  a  pour  of  rain  all  day  Monday.  Yesterday  was  snow  again  and 
very  cold.  To-day  it  is  thaw  and  rain.  I  am  trying  to  keep  up 
my  spirits  by  dividing  our  separation  into  periods  of  three  weeks 
each,  counting  on  your  getting  home,  if  possible,  by  March  i.  I  am 
very  busy  stuffing  dolls,  etc.,  for  Christmas,  and  it  keeps  me  amused. 
Last  night  Laurie  called,  but  I  sent  word  I  was  not  very  well.  I 
was  very  tired,  and,  as  I  told  you,  I  don't  intend  to  see  gentlemen 
company  till  your  return.  I  have  read  De  Foe,  which  I  thought 
very  interesting  and  well  written  ;  Willis'  '  Dashes  at  Life,'  most 
amusing  ;  and  '  Religious  Controversy  in  France,'  which  I  thought 
rather  heavy  and  not  at  all  Sunday  reading — that's  for  you  !  I  for- 
got to  say  how  I  proportion  my  time  :  From  this  till   25th  will  be 


96  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

three  weeks,  that  I  can  surely  bear  ;  then  three  weeks  more  will 
bring  it  to  six  weeks,  that,  too,  I  might  bear  if  you  were  to  be  here 
at  the  end  of  it  ;  then  I  must  not  look  into  the  twelve  weeks  to 
March  i  till  I  reach  the  six  weeks,  but  try  and  keep  my  eye  stead- 
fastly fixed  on  the  first  three,  then  the  end  of  the  second  quarter  ; 
when  I  get  there,  begin  again,  and  try  to  bear  another  three,  and  in 
the  last  three  you  will  surely^  surely  be  thinking  of  turning  your  face 
homeward.  But  I  must  Avrite  no  more,  as  I  am  very  late.  What 
did  you  do  with  the  agreement  about  our  room  for  April  i  ?  I 
could  not  find  it.  And  did  you  say  I  was  to  enter  the  money  drawn 
for  the  hotel  bills  in  the  back  part  of  the  account  book,  as  well  as  in 
the  column  for  house  expenses  ?  Excuse  my  stupidity,  and  God 
bless  you  a  thousand  times.  *  Be  thou  in  the  fear  of  the  Lord  all 
the  day  long,'  is  in  Proverbs,  23d  chapter  and  17th  verse.  I  read 
the  Jay  at  Anna  Winthrop's. 

"Your  own  "  H." 

"Washington,  Monday,  December  i,  1845. 
"  Mv  Blessed  Harriet  : 

"I  have  just  been  at  the  post  office  and  got  your  dear  letter  of 
Friday,  November  28.  It  grieves  me  to  see  that  you  suffered  so 
much  on  the  day  I  left,  but  thank  God  that  he  supported  and  com- 
forted you,  and  that  you  felt  that  he  was  a  very  present  help  in 
trouble.  It  was  strange  that  you  should  have  been  left  so  com- 
pletely alone  the  day  I  left,  when  you  have  generally  so  many 
people  when  you  don't  want  them.  I  am  thankful  to  dear  Maria 
and  Carrie  Neilson  for  their  kindness  to  you.  I  hope  the  former 
will  take  care  of  her  cold  in  this  vile  weather.  The  frost  has  gone 
to-day,  and  there  is  an  even  down-pour  of  rain,  which  will  make 
the  opening  of  Congress  not  so  satisfactory  as  it  might  have  been. 
The  House  assembles  at  twelve  o'clock,  and  it  is  now  half  past 
eleven,  and  as  we  have  fully  half  a  mile  to  go,  we  must  be  setting 
off.  I  sent  you  a  long  letter  yesterday,  addressed  to  the  care  of 
Dennistoun  &  Co.,  which  I  hope  reached  you  in  due  course. 

"We  have  just  returned  from  the  House  of  Representatives 
where  we  saw  the  Speaker  elected  ;  the  person  chosen  was  a  Mr. 
John  W.  Davis,  a  large  and  rather  good-looking  man,  like  a  master 
mason.     The  votes  for  him  were  120  out  of  a  House  of  211,  conse- 


ON  MY  WAY  TO  NEW  ORLEANS,  DECEMBER,  1 845.   97 

quently  he  had,  as  required  by  law,  a  clear  majority  of  the  whole.  The 
clerk  then  requested  two  members  to  lead  the  Speaker  to  the  chair, 
and  two  respectable  elderly,  but  awkward-looking,  men  went  to  Mr. 
Davis,  but  instead  of  giving  him  their  arms,  took  his,  so  that  the  effect 
was  precisely  as  if  they  had  been  leading  off  a  pickpocket  to  jail. 
The  general  appearance  of  the  House  of  Representatives  was  that 
of  well  clothed  (not  well  dressed)  mediocrity.  The  members  looked 
like  decent  shopkeepers  and  farmers  dressed  in  their  Sunday 
clothes,  in  short  not  by  any  means  an  aristocratic,  but  a  very 
respectable,  democratic  assembly;  the  only  really  gentlemanlike  man 
I  saw,  was  the  venerable  John  Quincy  Adams.  He  seemed  to  be  the 
oldest  member  of  the  House,  and  swore  in  the  Speaker,  I  suppose 
on  that  account.  Everything  was  conducted  in  the  most  orderly 
way,  not  a  single  cheer  when  the  Democratic  party  elected  their 
Speaker.  We  find  that  the  President's  Message  is  not  to  be  delivered 
until  to-morrow.  I  was  for  going  off  to-night  but  Sellar  was 
anxious  to  hear  it,  or  rather  see  it  delivered,  so  we  tossed  up 
whether  to  go,  or  remain  another  day,  and  Sellar  won,  so  we  shall 
stay  till  to-morrow.  It  is  now  not  far  from  3  p.  m.,  when  we  dine, 
and  I  must  take  this  to  the  post  office  before  that  time,  so  I  must 
close. 

"  I  read  the  first  chapter  and  the  introduction  of  '  Goode's  Better 
Covenant'  yesterday  evening,  and  also  some  of  my  dear  Charlotte's 
hymns.  I  keep  wonderfully  cheerful,  considering,  but  want  to  be 
moving  again,  as  traveling  agrees  better  with  me  than  staying  still. 
It  has  turned  out  a  fine  afternoon.  I  hope  to  write  to  you  to-mor- 
row, but  as  I  will  keep  this  letter  open  probably  till  evening,  you 
will  not  receive  it  for  two  days  after  you  get  this.  I  intend  to  send 
you  a  letter  addressed  to  the  New  York  Hotel  along  with  this;  please 
write  to  me  to  Charleston  which  you  get  first.  God  bless  you  and 
my  darling  children. 

"  Ever  thine  own 

"Wm.  W." 

"Washington,  December  2,  1845. 
"  My  Darling  Harriet  : 

"  Here  I  am  seated  at  the  window  of  my  bedroom,  which  looks  on 
a  balcony  in  the  interior  square  of  the  hotel,  at   4.30   p.  m.,  after 


98  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

dining  in  the  ladies'  ordinary,  where  Sellar  and  I  got  admittance 
to-day,  being  tired  of  the  ordinary  for  the  tobacco  chewers.  We 
took  a  bottle  of  champagne  for  the  good  of  the  house,  and  are  now 
in  a 'concatenation  accordingly.'  After  breakfast  to-day  we  went 
to  the  magnetic  telegraph  office.  The  telegraph  communicates 
with  Baltimore,  thirty-seven  miles  distant,  and  a  question  is  asked 
and  replied  to  from  Baltimore  in  less  than  half  a  minute.  A  signal, 
merely  calling  for  attention  at  the  Baltimore  end,  was  absolutely 
replied  to  as  quick  as  thought  !  It  beat  Herr  Alexander's  tricks  all 
to  sticks,  and  really  was  like  magic.  We  asked  the  price  of  flour 
at  Baltimore,  and  had  a  reply  in  a  minute,  '  Six  dollars.'  I  asked 
them  to  repeat  my  name  from  Baltimore,  which  was  given  them 
from  this,  and  almost  instantaneously  the  reply  was  received, 
'  William  Wood.'  I  inclose  the  little  slip  of  paper  on  which  the 
telegraph  marks  the  answer.  You  will  see  that  the  letters  are  com- 
posed of  dots  and   lines  :    for  instance  :  " '  means    W. 

I  enclose  also  the  telegraphic  alphabet  and  numerals,  which  I  have 
no  doubt,  with  a  little  explanation  from  Curly  Head,  commonly 
called  John  Walter,  you  will  easily  comprehend.  The  paper  on 
which  the  indents  are  made  is  on  a  small  wheel  and  unrolls  by  the 
action  of  the  galvanism,  and  the  dots  and  lines  are  made  by 
knocking  on  a  sort  of  key,  the  dot  by  a  smart  rap,  the  line  by  a  rap 
and  then  leaving  the  finger  on  for  an  instant.  It  requires  great 
practice  to  do  the  thing  correctly,  every  word  has  to  be  spelled,  and 
the  spelling  it  by  raps  and  pauses  would  require  as  long  a  time  as 
to  learn  to  play  on  the  piano.  After  this  we  went  to  the  Capitol. 
Sellar  being  a  Conservative  went  to  the  Senate.  I  being  a  Radical 
went  to  the  House  of  Representatives.  After  some  business  of  a 
routine  nature,  such  as  moving  that  the  House  do  now  appoint  a 
public  printer,  and  two  speeches  thereon,  a  messenger  arrived  from 
the  President  with  his  Message.  This  was  wrapped  up  in  a  paper 
like  a  very  large  letter.  The  clerk  of  the  House  opened  it,  and  imme- 
diately began  to  read.  A  flag  was  hoisted  on  the  top  of  the 
Capitol,  and  the  moment  it  was  seen  the  magnetic  telegraph  gave  a 
signal  to  Baltimore,  thirty-seven  miles  distant,  and  there,  packed  in 
a  railway  car  under  the  control  of  the  postmaster,  were  numerous 
printed  copies  of  the  Message.  And  as  soon  as  the  signal  was  given 
that  the   Message  was  begun  to  be  read  in  Congress,    off  started 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS,   DECEMBER,    1 845.       99 

this  car  to  Philadelphia,  and  then  by  express  the  Message  would  be 
conveyed  to  New  York,  and  you  will  have  it  there,  I  fancy,  to-night, 
but  certainly  to-morrow  morning.  Soon  after  the  Message  was 
brought  in,  and  while  the  clerk  was  reading  it,  printed  copies  were 
distributed  to  the  members,  and  after  that  boys  came  round  and  sold 
them  for  five  cents  to  the  canaille  in  the  gallery,  of  whom  I,  being 
one,  bought  the  inclosed,  which  please  '  read,  mark,  learn,  and 
inwardly  digest.'  I  think  it  on  the  whole  a  creditable  document  to 
James  K.  Polk,  and  hardly  so  warlike  as  I  anticipated,  and  were  I 
an  American  I  would  say  amen  to  every  word  of  it,  barring  some 
little  weaknesses  on  the  tariff.  I  do  think  we  Britishers  may  be 
proud  of  our  child.  It  is  grand  to  see  a  young  and  great  nation 
using  our  own  language,  and  extending  its  power  over  this  continent, 
and  its  influence  over  the  world.  I  heartily  and  ex  anvno  bid  it 
God  speed,  but  at  the  same  time  it  mustn't  think  to  get  Oregon  from 
the  old  gentleman,  just  yet.  But  if  it  have  patience  and  wait,  adopt 
as  Mr.  Calhoun  says,  '  a  masterly  inactivity,*  Oregon  in  time  will  drop 
into  its  mouth,  and  Canada  also,  for  I  am  persuaded  that  self- 
government  has  such  charms  that  all  the  states  on  this  continent 
will  in  time  be  attracted  into  the  federation  of  the  United  States, 
and  I  only  wish  I  saw  my  own  country  under  the  sway  of  its  people, 
and  queens  and  nobles  sent  on  their  travels. 

"  We  go  on  board  the  steamer  for  Acquia  Creek  (about  forty-four 
miles  distant)  to-night  at  nine  o'clock,  and  I  suppose  will  reach 
Richmond  to-morrow  (Wednesday)  about  dinner  time.  I  don't 
know  how  long  we  may  stay  there,  nor  when  you  will  receive  another 
letter  from  me,  but  probably  not  for  three  or  four  days  after  you 
get  this.  There  was  a  beautiful  little  child  sat  opposite  to  me 
to-day  at  dinner,  about  three  or  four  years  old,  with  long  curly  hair; 
she  behaved  remarkably  well,  and  had  a  sort  of  dignity  about  her 
like  our  little  Helen.  I  had  *  a  time  of  refreshing  from  the  Lord  ' 
this  morning  before  I  got  up,  and  I  prayed  for  all  of  you  individ- 
ually. May  God  bless  and  watch  over  you  all.  Give  my  kind  love 
to  Maria  and  Mr.  De  Peyster.  Tell  John  Hone  that  Mr.  Slidell 
has  gone  as  Minister  to  Mexico,  and  I  have  left  his  letter  to  him 
in  the  post  office  here.  God  forever  bless  you  and  my  darling 
children,  and  restore  us  to  each  other  in  health  and  happiness. 

"  Ever  thine  own  "  Wm.  W." 


lOO  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"Exchange  Hotel,  Richmond,  Va.,  December  3,  1845. 
"  My  Sweetest   Wife  : 

"  We  went  on  board  the  steamer  Augusta  last  evening  at  Wash- 
ington about  eight  o'clock.  I  sat  up  till  ten  reading  the  Edinburgh 
Review,  and  then  took  off  my  coat  and  shoes,  lay  down  in  my  berth, 
where  I  got  snatches  of  sleep  until  about  5.30  a.  m.,  when  I  rose, 
went  on  deck  to  the  washing  room  and  performed  my  ablutions 
in  a  tin  basin  and  with  a  jack-towel  ;  there  was  no  soap,  but 
I  fortunately  had  my  own  cake.  I  rose  before  any  of  the  rest 
and  had  in  consequence  the  washroom  all  to  myself,  and  the 
first  wipe  of  the  jack-towel.  There  was  a  brush  and  comb  for 
the  accommodation  of  those  who  were  not  selfish  enough  to  carry 
such  luxuries  for  tlieir  own  peculiar  use.  Poor  Sellar,  who  did  not 
rise  for  twenty  minutes  after  me,  complained  bitterly  of  the  want  of 
soap,  etc.,  and  did  not  get  himself  shaved,  which  I  did,  although 
the  water  was  piercing  cold,  the  morning  being  very  frosty.  About 
three  in  the  morning  the  passengers  who  left  New  York  on  Tuesday 
morning  came  on  board,  so  that  I  might  have  been  as  far  on  my 
journey  as  I  now  am  (had  I  not  stopped  on  the  way)  if  I  had  not 
left  you  till  yesterday  morning.  The  thought  of  this  bothered  me, 
although  I  am  glad  that  I  have  seen  the  President  and  the  opening 
of  Congress.  We  passed  Mount  Vernon,  the  birth  and  burial 
place  of  Washington,  before  daylight.  When  day  broke  I  found 
the  shores  of  the  Potomac  like  those  of  Hempstead  Harbor,  Long 
Island.  We  landed  at  Acquia  Creek,  a  very  pretty  inlet  from  the 
Potomac,  which  was  covered  with  wild  ducks.  Here  a  long  wharf 
projected  into  the  water,  on  which  the  railway  ran  out.  We  got 
seated  comfortably  in  a  plain,  but  commodious  car,  and  passed 
through  a  poor,  bleak  country,  the  weather  awfully  cold  and  our 
feet  frozen,  although  there  was  a  stove  in  the  car  ;  but  for  the  sake 
of  good  air  Sellar  and  I  sat  as  far  from  it  as  we  could.  In  the  course 
of  our  journey  we  passed  Fredericksburg,  a  straggling,  dull-looking 
town  on  the  Rappahannock,  and  about  half  past  twelve  we  arrived 
here.  This  town  is  situated  on  the  James  River,  and  is  celebrated 
for  its  flour  and  tobacco  ;  it  is  the  metropolis  of  Virginia,  and  here 
the  Legislature  meets.  This  is  a  large,  dingy,  but  pretty  comforta- 
ble hotel.  I  am  in  No.  19,  '  up  three  pair,'  with  two  little  beds  in  it. 
I  have  on  a  fire.     We  dined  in  the  ladies'  ordinary,  and  near  us  sat 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS,   DECEMBER,    1845.      Id 

a  Mr,  Lee,  who  I  found  out  was  Mr.  De  Peyster's  friend,  Mr.  Carter 
Lee  ;  so  after  dinner  I  delivered  Mr.  De  Peyster's  letter  to  him.  He 
is  a  very  gentlemanly,  pleasant  man,  and  gave  me  a  very  cordial 
greeting ;  asked  why  I  did  not  deliver  the  letter  to  him  during  dinner, 
that  he  might  have  had  a  glass  of  wine  with  me,  and  introduced 
me  to  his  friends.  He  said  he  had  a  very  good  esteem  for  Mr.  De 
P.,  etc.,  etc.  He  introduced  me  to  several  gentlemen,  and  after  I 
had  gone  up  to  my  room  to  write  this  letter,  he  came  up  and  asked 
me  to  go  with  him  to  an  evening  party  at  a  Mr.  Ellis'.  I  begged 
off  on  the  plea  of  being  tired,  and  an  old  married  man,  but  he 
asked  Sellar  to  go,  and  he  is  going  at  nine  o'clock,  although  he 
feels  pretty  well  knocked  up.  It  has  been  snowing  ever  since  we 
came  here,  nevertheless  we  have  made  two  calls,  and  were  shown 
by  Mr.  Haxall  over  his  flour  mills,  which  were  well  worth  seeing. 
Mr.  Haxall,  who  is  a  friend  of  Dawson's,  has  asked  us  to  dine 
with  him  to-morrow  at  five  o'clock,  which  we  intend  doing,  and 
think  of  leaving  on  Friday  morning,  at  eight  o'clock,  for  Peters- 
burg. Coming  on  the  railway  to-day  I  read  in  the  Edinburgh 
Review  *  Heimskringla,'  and  all  '  McCuUoch  on  Taxation,'  so  I 
don't  think  I  can  be  accused  of  light  frivolous  reading.  I  feel 
seedy  and  stupid  to-night,  and  as  it  is  about  half  past  eight  I  shall 
betake  myself  to  bed.  I  inclose  picture  of  the  hotel  at  Washing- 
ton at  which  I  stayed,  for  my  dear  little  Willie.  God  bless  you, 
dearest  one.     Good-night. 

"  Thursday,  December  4,  1845.  ^*^  i^  ^  week  to-day  since  I  left 
home.  I  slept  well  last  night,  and  have  just  breakfasted.  Sellar  has 
not  yet  made  his  appearance.  This  is  a  nasty,  cold,  sleety,  sloppy 
day,  which  is  a  pity,  as  I  fancy  in  good  weather  that  this  is  a  pretty 
place.  I  have  just  been  re-reading  your  letter  of  November  28,  and 
thank  God  that  you  feel  his  presence. 

1  think,  when  John  Walter  goes  to  Philadelphia,  he  ought  to  take, 
z.%from  Charlotte,  a  present  to  Bessie  Kane,  '  a  little  balm  and  a  little 
honey,  spices  and  myrrh,  nuts  and  almonds  ' — that  is  to  say,  a  case 
of  sewing  implements,  a  very  neat  one,  as,  really,  Mr.  Kane  has  been 
very  kind  to  me.  Sellar  has  just  come  into  my  room  (five  minutes 
past  ten),  not  having  got  to  bed  till  two  this  morning.  There  was  a 
very  large  party,  and  he  has  got  an  invitation  to  a  large  ball  on  Friday. 
The  great  belle  here  is  a  Miss  Emma  Carmichael,  who  lives  at  this 


102  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

hotel,  and  is  a  great  flirt.     Sellar  says  he  knew  her  as  well  in  six 
minutes  as  he  ever  knew  any  other  woman  in  six  months. 

The  following  lines  quoted  from  the  Venerable  Bede  in  the  review 
of  Heimskringla,  I  have  learnt  and  they  keep  rhyming  in  my  head  : 

"  '  For  that  inevitable  road 

That  leads  him  to  his  last  abode 

None  can  too  well  prepare; 
Or  weigh  too  wisely  ere  he  go 
The  good  or  ill  his  soul  must  know, 

When  brought  to  judgment  there.'* 

"  Thanks  be  to  God  that  our  preparation  was  made  on  Calvary, 
and  that  he  giveth  us  the  victory  through  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 

"  3  P.  M.  Sellar  and  I  have  just  returned  from  making  sundry 
business  calls,  and  from  seeing  the  House  of  Delegates  in  session,  etc. 
We  go  to  dine  at  Mrs.  Haxall's  at  five  o'clock,  and  intend  to  start 
for  Petersburg  at  8  a.  m.  to-morrow.  We  hope  to  do  what  we  have 
to  do  in  Petersburg  in  the  course  of  to-morrow,  and  leave  it  to-mor- 
row afternoon  for  Wilmington.  If  we  manage  this  we  should, 
traveling  all  night,  reach  Wilmington  on  Saturday  about  noon, 
which  would  bring  us  to  Charleston  on  Sunday  morning.  I  don't 
think  you  can  hear  from  me  again,  therefore,  till  Thursday  or 
Friday  next — that  is,  till  nth  or  12th  inst.  God  forever  bless  you 
and  my  beloved  children,  and  watch  over  us  all,  and  unite  us  again 
in  health  and  happiness. 

"  Ever  your  own  attached  husband, 

"  William  Wood." 

"  Petersburg,  Va.,  Friday,  December  5,  1845. 
"  My  Blessed  Wife  : 

"  I  have  only  just  time  to  say  that  we  left  Richmond  this  morning 
at  eight  and  arrived  here  at  ten,  and  leave  again  at  3  p.  m.  for  Wil- 
mington, where  we  should  arrive  at  noon  to-morrow.  The  weather 
is  still  very  cold  and  frosty,  but  clear.  We  have  been  making  busi- 
ness calls,  and,  since  making  them,  I  have  been  writing  a  business 
letter  to  New  Orleans.  I  merely  send  these  few  lines  to  say  I  am 
quite  well,  knowing  that  you  would  prefer  such  a  short  scrawl  as  I 

*  These  lines  are  by  Walter  Scott,  and,  I  think,  from  the  "  Lay  of  the  Last 
Minstrel." — November  6,  1891. 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS,   DECEMBER,    1 845.      IO3 

now  send,  to  nothing.     I   think  we  have  laid  the  foundation  for 
future  business  both  here  and  at  Richmond,  which  is  satisfactory. 

"  We  had  quite  a  pleasant  dinner  party  yesterday  at  Mr.  Haxall's. 
Mr.  Carter  Lee,  Mr.  De  Peyster's  friend,  was  asked  to  meet  us.  He 
is  a  most  comical  fellow,  and  yet  a  perfect  gentleman.  He  sang  us 
a  negro  song,  and  told  us  some  capital  Yankee  stories.  Sellar  has 
nearly  lost  his  heart  to  Miss  Carmichael,  who  is  a  great  flirt  and 
about  twenty-eight  or  thirty,  I  should  judge  ;  is  pretty  and  has  a 
fine  figure.  I  don't  think  he  seriously  cares  about  her,  but  he  cer- 
tainly is  a  little  '  smitified,'  and  she  gave  him  plenty  of  encourage- 
ment. 

"  God  forever  bless  you,  my  dear  one.  Give  my  kindest  love  to 
all  my  dear  children.  God  bless  them,  and  may  he  watch  over  you 
and  them  and  me,  and  unite  us  all  in  health  of  body  and  mind. 

"  Ever  thine  own 

"Wm.  W." 

"  New  York  Hotel,  December  7,  1845. 
"(Charlotte's  Birthday.) 
*'  My  Beloved  Will  : 

"Your  dear  letter  No.  6  arrived  last  night,  and  made  me  feel  very 
sad — it  was  cheerful  too — yet  the  thought  of  your  now  being  fairly 
on  the  move,  and  getting  beyond  one  day's  mail  from  me  makes  me 
feel  as  if  you  had  started  afresh,  and  then  those  touching  lines  of 
Bede's  [Scott's]  quite  upset  me. 

"  '  For  that  inevitable  road 

That  leads  him  to  his  last  abode 

None  can  too  well  prepare  ; 
Or  weigh  too  wisely  'ere  he  go 
The  good  or  ill  his  soul  must  know, 

When  brought  to  judgment  there.' 

"  I  had  Harriet  Mills  here  to-day,  and  felt,  as  well  as  low-spirited, 
discontented  and  rebellious,  but  Aunt  Patty  [Mrs.  David  Codwise. — 
W.  W.]  came  in  after  church  to  spend  the  evening.  She  had  just 
come  from  the  funeral  of  the  husband  of  a  friend  of  hers.  Aunt 
Patty  said  that  the  widow  was  a  child  of  God,  yet  could  not  be  com- 
forted, and  that  they  feared  the  loss  of  her  reason.  This  incident 
spoke  to  me  as  a  solemn  warning  from  God,  and  Aunt  Patty  con- 


104  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

versed  in  a  sweet  Christian  strain,  comforting  me  and  convincing 
me  of  sin.  In  my  murmuring  and  rebellion  against  God  she  said  : 
'  Have  you  not  often  prayed  that  God  would  draw  nearer  to  you  ; 
and  has  not  your  husband  so  satisfied  and  filled  your  mind  that  it 
seemed  a  sort  of  barrier  to  that  close  communion  with  Him  ?  Now 
he  is  withdrawn  and  Christ  can  interpose  and  come  near  ;  he  has  sep- 
arated both  of  you  to  place  himself  between.'  I  felt  the  truth  of 
this,  and  blessed  God  for  the  truth  he  had  sent  to  me  through  her 
instrumentality. 

"  To-day  the  letters  by  the  steamer  arrived.  One  from  Miss  Per- 
fect again,  whose  last  I  did  not  answer,  you  remember.  Her  health 
is  slowly  sinking,  and  she  writes  in  her  usual  devotional  and  com- 
forting strain.  A  letter  also  to  dear  Charlotte,  in  which  she  exhorts 
her  to  make  God  her  portion  and  assures  her  how  unceasing  her 
prayers  have  been  and  will  be  for  us  all,  drew  plentiful  tears  from 
both  of  us. 

"  There  is  a  long  letter  from  dear  Mary,  written  with  cheerful 
submission,  and  asking  for  your  prayers  for  her  and  Mr.  Ferguson, 
that  their  trials  may  be  sanctified  to  them.  The  date  is  November 
15,  No.  44  Charlotte  Square,  Edinburgh,  where  they  have  taken  a 
house  till  March.  She  says  Mr.  F.'s  complaint  is  a  disease  of  the 
blood  vessels  of  the  chest,  and  a  slight  palsy  of  one  of  the  optic 
muscles  owing  to  a  local  fullness  of  blood.  He  is  ordered  to  give  up 
all  business  for  three  months  ;  at  the  end  of  that  time,  if  better,  he 
may  take  a  moderate  share  of  work,  but  all  hard  work  and  head  work 
must  be  forever  given  up,  and  perhaps  he  may  live  to  be  an  old 
man,  but  never  a  strong  one.  She  herself  is  much  better  and  they 
are  treated  with  great  kindness  in  Edinburgh  and  like  it  very  much. 
They  are  going  to  sell  their  Newton  Place  house  and  live  at  Blantyre 
Lodge  entirely.  This  is  all  her  news.  I  send  you  Cross'  letter  and 
all  the  business  letters.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Dawson  have  just  been  here 
and  he  thought  I  had  better  do  so.  Also  he  assures  me  you  could 
not  leave  Charleston  for  some  days,  and  this  letter  will  be  sure  to 
catch  you.  Maria  and  De  Peyster,  and  John  and  Jane  Hone  have 
also  been  here,  Lawrie  called  again  night  before  last,  and  I 
thought  I  had  better  not  send  him  away.  Mr.  De  P.  came  in  when 
he  was  here  and  took  J.  Walter  to  the  historical  lecture  with  him. 
All  well.    God  bless  you  my  own.  "H." 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS,   DECEMBER,    1 845.      I05 

"Room  No.  31,  Charleston  Hotel,  Charleston,  S.  C, 
"  Sunday,  December  7,  1845. 
"  My  Blessed  Harriet  : 

"  I  arrived  here  at  four  this  morning  after  an  excellent  passage 
from  Wilmington,  which  we  left  at  i  P.  m.  yesterday.  My  last  to 
you  was  written  from  Petersburg  that  day  at  4  P.  M.  Traveled  all 
that  night  in  dirty,  uncomfortable  railway  cars,  stopping  at  10  p.  m. 
for  supper  at  Weldon,  N.  C,  and  then  at  7  a.  m.  on  Saturday 
at  a  wooden  house  by  the  roadside.  The  weather  was  bitterly 
cold  until  we  got  near  Wilmington,  N.  C,  which  we  did  at 
II  a.  m.,  Saturday.  Here  the  weather  became  delightfully  mild,  and 
there  being  abundance  of  a  sort  of  live  oak,  as  well  as  pines,  the 
country  looked  quite  green  and  pretty. 

"  We  got  into  a  tolerably  good  steamer  called  the  Wilmington, 
and  really  had  quite  a  delightful  passage  ;  the  night  was  most  lovely, 
and  the  moon  and  stars  shining  in  all  their  splendor.  The  boat 
was  very  dirty,  and  so  I  lay  down  without  undressing.  I  feel  rather 
seedy  to-day,  and  have  only  five  minutes  before  the  mail  closes. 
Sellar  and  I  have  been  at  church  to  hear  a  Dr.  Post,  Avho  gave  us  a 
very  good  sermon  as  regarded  doctrine.  He  is  a  Presbyterian  and 
wore  a  gown  and  bands.  The  church  was  very  large  and  circular 
and  old-fashioned,  but  had  a  good  organ.  The  congregation  small. 
I  shall  not  leave  this,  I  think,  till  Thursday.  You  might  write,  when 
you  receive  this,  to  me  addressed  '  Care  of  R.  Hutchison,  Esq., 
Savannah,'  and  if  sent  off  in  due  course,  your  letter  may  catch  me 
there,  and  if  not  it  will  be  sent  after  me.  God  bless  you,  my  dearest 
one.  Thank  God  with  me  for  all  his  mercies  in  bringing  me  safe  thus 
far,  when  two  engines  were  smashed  to  pieces,  only  two  days  before 
we  came,  on  the  Weldon  railway.  A  gentleman  who  left  New  York 
with  us,  but  did  not  stay  on*the  road  as  we  did,  was  in  the  train  at 
the  time.  No  one  was  seriously  hurt.  God  bless  and  watch  over 
my  dear  children.     Kiss  them  all  for  me. 

"  Ever  your  own  attached  husband, 

"William  Wood." 


I06  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  Charleston,  S.  C,  Sunday,  December  7,  1845. 
"  My  Dearest  Harriet  : 

*'  I  wrote  you  a  few  lines  this  morning  to  tell  you  of  my  safe 
arrival,  and,  by  the  kindness  of  the  postmaster,  got  my  letter  in  after 
the  box  was  closed.  I  omitted  to  say  that  your  letter  of  Thursday 
has  not  arrived  yet  ;  it  is  not  due,  indeed,  until  to-morrow,  so  that 
the  only  letter  I  have  received  from  you  yet  is  the  one  I  got  at 
Washington,  written  the  day  after  I  left,  so  that  the  one  I  expect 
to-morrow  will  give  me  a  week's  later  intelligence,  and  God  grant  I 
may  receive  good  news  of  all  my  precious  ones. 

"  I  have  so  far  been  most  mercifully  dealt  with  on  my  journey, 
and  my  spirits  have  kept  up  wonderfully — not  but  that  I  often  wish 
I  were  thus  far  on  my  journey  home  instead  of  so  far  on  my  way 
from  it.  I  think  you  must  let  my  dear  little  Bessie's  hair  grow  long 
behind  and  curl.  Now,  Bessie,  you  needn't  say  '  Bother  ! '  because  it 
will  make  you  look  a  great  deal  better  after  it  does  grow.  I  have 
just  seen  a  little  girl  of  your  age  in  the  ladies'  parlor  with  curls 
down  to  her  waist,  and  she  looked  remarkably  pretty.  This  day 
was  delightful,  mild  as  milk  and  quite  clear.  I  saw  lots  of  roses  in 
full  bloom  in  the  open  air  ;  yucca  gloriosa,  laura  mundi,  and 
magnolia  trees  all  quite  green  and  beautiful.  A  great  part  of  this 
town  puts  me  in  mind  of  the  French  part  of  New  Orleans  and  of  the 
houses  far  out  in  Camp  Street.  The  city  is  situated  on  a  point  or 
neck  of  land,  on  one  side  of  which  runs  the  river  Ashley  and  on  the 
other  tlie  river  Cooper,  both  falling  or  running  into  Charleston  Bay, 
which  washes  the  point  between  the  two  rivers.  There  is  a  fine 
promenade,  like  the  paved  part  of  the  Battery  in  New  York,  along  a 
portion  of  the  bay.  I  saw -the  old  mansion  that  used  to  belong  to 
Buchanan,  Wood  &  Co.  some  twenty-four  years  ago  ;  it  must  have 
been  a  very  fine  house  in  its  day  ;  even  now  it  is  large  and  substantial. 
Three  windows  on  one  side  the  door,  and  three  stories  high,  and  very 
lofty,  built  of  yellowish  brick  ;  and  here  my  poor  father  spent  six  or 
seven  months  miserably  before  his  unhappy  death.  It  was  very  hard 
for  him  to  be  separated  from  his  wife  and  family — they  at  such  a 
distance — business  bad,  traveling  horrible,  and  he  suffering  awfully 
from  seasickness.  By  the  way,  I  really  think  it  quite  providential 
that  we  went  by  sea  last  winter  instead  of  coming  this  route,  or 
'  rowt '  as  the  natives  call  it.     No  doubt  we  could  have  done  it,  but 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS,   DECEMBER.    1845.      ^^7 

it  would  have  been  awfully  uncomfortable,  and  I  fancy  the  worst 
has  to  come  yet,  so  I  really  feel  thankful  that  you  are  all  safe  and 
comfortable,  as  I  hope,  in  New  York  instead  of  leading  the  nomadic 
life  I  am  doing.  There  has  been  nothing  at  all  interesting  to  be 
seen  after  leaving  Washington,  the  country  being  generally  bleak 
and  barren.  Tom  Sellar  and  I  took  a  long  walk  this  afternoon,  our 
dinner  making  us  too  late  for  afternoon  church.  I  was  rather 
inclined  to  go  into  one,  but  he  said  he  was  tired  and  sleepy,  and  so 
was  I,  rather,  so  we  took  a  small  'meditation  among  the  tombs.' 
How  I  would  like  to  be  with  you  this  evening  !  I  hope  God  is 
manifesting  himself  to  you  and  that  you,  my  beloved  one,  have  by 
his  blessed  Spirit  been  enabled  to  speak  sound  words  to  my  dear 
children,  so  that  both  she  that  soweth  and  they  that  reap  may  rejoice 
together,  and  I  hope  your  united  prayers  will  ascend  to  the  Throne 
of  Grace  for  me,  that  I  may  be  blessed  spiritually  and  temporally, 
and  preserved  in  all  my  journeyings,  and  may  God  in  his  infinite 
mercy  bless  and  protect  you  and  my  children  and  spare  us  all  to 
each  other.  Good-night,  my  beloved ;  good-night,  John  Walter, 
Charlotte,  Bessie,  Harriet,  dear,  tender-hearted  Willie,  and  little  lady 
Helen.  I  will  now  go  and  take  a  spell  at  Goode  before  going  to 
bed.  Tom  Sellar  is  sitting  reading  Macaulay's  '  Lays  of  Ancient 
Rome.' 

"  December  8.  The  mail  is  in,  but  brings  no  letters  from  you. 
In  fact,  no  letters  are  received  later  than  December  3.  Yours  would 
leave  the  5th,  so  it  won't  be  here  before  to-morrow.  I  have  been 
very  busy  all  morning,  and  have  just  time  to  add  these  few  lines 
before  dinner.  This  is  a  delicious,  warm  day,  like  an  English  sum- 
mer. The  only  marvels  I  have  seen  to-day  are  the  turkey  buzzards, 
hopping  in  flocks  about  the  streets,  as  tame  as  pigeons,  picking  up 
the  garbage.  It  seems  they  are  the  only  scavengers  in  Charleston, 
and  no  one  is  allowed  to  molest  them,  so  they  increase  and  multiply. 
I  shall  not  probably  write  again  until  Wednesday,  which  will  be  my 
last  from  this.     I  continue  very  well.     God  bless  you  all. 

"  Ever  your  own  attached 

"Wm.  W." 


I08  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  Charleston,  S.  C,  December  9,  1845. 
"  My  Darling  Wife  : 

"  I  am  still  without  any  letters  from  you,  owing  to  the  failure  of 
the  confounded  mail,  nothing  having  been  received  to-day  north  of 
Petersburg.  I  dined  to-day  at  a  Mrs.  Muir's,  and  after  dinner 
spent  the  evening  at  old  John  Eraser's.  He  is  a  very  old  corre- 
spondent of  our  house,  and  a  fine-looking  old  man.  He  will  have 
spent  forty-five  consecutive  Christmases  in  Charleston  if  he  lives  till 
next  Christmas.  Sellar  and  I  also  called  on  a  Mr.  Thomas  Aston 
Coffin,  a  planter  who  lives  here,  and  a  gentlemanly,  well-informed 
little  man  ;  has  a  fine  large  house,  and  lives  in  good  style.  He  has  a 
plantation  in  Mississippi  of  which  we  have  the  management.  He 
was  very  polite  to  us,  drove  us  in  his  carriage  to  see  a  rice  mill,  and 
put  his  carriage  at  our  disposal  ;  we  are  to  dine  with  him  to-morrow. 
We  then  called  on  a  Mr,  Mitchell  King,  to  whom  Jacob  Harvey 
gave  us,  unasked,  a  letter  of  introduction.  He  lives  in  a  magnificent 
large  house,  the  largest  in  Charleston,  I  think,  and  I  was  rather 
indisposed  to  go.  However,  we  went,  and  in  the  course  of  conver- 
sation it  came  out  that  he  knew  my  father  intimately  twenty-four 
years  ago,  and  that  when  my  father  was  in  Charleston  he  was  quite 
domesticated  at  Mr.  King's,  who,  being  a  lawyer,  was  the  legal 
adviser  of  my  father's  house,  Buchanan,  Wood  &  Co.  ;  and,  more 
than  that,  Mr.  King  himself  came,  forty  years  ago,  from  Crail  in  the 
East  Neuk  o'  Fife,  which  is  just  nine  miles  from  Elie,  so  you  may 
be  sure  I  got  a  most  cordial  reception.  We  were  asked  to  dinner 
to-morrow,  but,  being  engaged,  we  are  to  go  there  in  the  evening, 
and  from  thence  to  a  scientific  party  at  a  Dr.  Bachman's.  Mr.  King 
is  going  on  to  Savannah  on  Thursday  along  with  us.  Old  Mr. 
Fraser  said  that  seeing  me  did  him  a  deal  of  good  ;  '  he  felt  as  if  he 
had  met  a  second  cousin,'  which  would  not  convey  any  great  cordi- 
ality of  feeling  to  your  mind  or  Maria's,  but  means  a  great  deal  of 
kindness  when  said  by  a  Highlander. 

"  I  heard  a  negro  woman,  very  black,  say  to  a  man  of  the  same 
color,  'You  shan't  kiss  me,  you  ugly,  black  nigger  !'•  Sambo  grinned 
from  ear  to  ear  as  I  passed,  and  I  couldn't  help  laughing  at  such  an 
example  of  the  'pot  calling  the  kettle  black,'  etc.,  etc.  Now  I 
intended  to  have  written  you  a  longer  screed,  but  just  as  I  sat  down 
at  half  past   nine,  in  came  a  business  dispatch   from   New  Orleans, 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS,   DECEMBER,    1 845.      IO9 

in  reply  to  which  I  had  to  write  a  reply  of  four  pages,  which  letter 
I  must  rise  and  put  in  the  post  office  by  six  to-morrow  morning  ;  so 
I  must  be  up  at  five,  and  it  is  now  10.45  P-  M-  -^'^  ^7  l3,rger  paper 
is  finished  with  writing  to  you  and  business  letters,  and  lending  Tom 
Sellar,  who  has  bought  none  for  himself.  Good-night.  God  bless 
you  and  all  my  dear  ones.  By  the  way,  Mr.  Coffin  knows  Delancy 
Kane  and  Anna  Russell,  and  went  down  the  Mississippi  in  the  same 
boat  with  Helen  Nicholson  in  October,  but  did  not  know  she  was 
Anna  Russell's  sister.  He  and  his  family  go  to  Newport  in 
summer. 

"December  19.  Your  most  delightful  letter  of  November  30 
and  December  4  has  come  to  hand  to-day.  Thank  you  a  thousand 
times  for  all  the  kindness  and  tenderness  and  good  advice  it  con- 
tains. God  forever  bless  you,  my  dearest  one,  and  thank  my  dear 
John  Walter  for  his  excellent,  well-expressed  letter,  with  only  one 
ill-spelled  word  in  it  :  '  Stayed  for  some  time,'  ought  to  be  '  Staid  for 
some  time.'  [I  rather  think  he  was  right. — Wm.  W.,  June  18,  1891.] 
You  must  enter  your  weekly  bills  both  in  the  front  and  back  of  the 
book.  You  will  find  the  agreement,  about  getting  the  room  on  the 
first  April,  wrapped  inside  the  original  agreement  about  our  board 
and  lodging,  and  that,  I  think,  is  in  the  sort  of  queer  pocket  in  the 
top  of  your  portmanteau.  I  know  I  put  it  carefully  past  somewhere, 
but  cannot  quite  recollect  where.  I  intend  to  leave  this  for  Savan- 
nah at  9  A.  M.  to-morrow,  so  I  will  not  get  my  English  letters  or  any 
from  you  to-morrow,  but  hope  to  receive  them  in  Savannah  on  Sat- 
urday, December  13.  By  the  way,  was  not  the  5th  or  the  7th  dear 
Charlotte's  birthday  ?  I  can  no  more  recollect  which  is  the  real  day 
than  I  can  tell  which  of  the  brothers  is  John  and  which  George 
Lawrie. 

"  I  do  indeed  thank  God  that  you  are  keeping  up  your  spirits 
so  well,  and  that  they  appear  to  be  stayed  upon  the  Rock  of 
Ages.  Mine  are  supported  by  mixed  considerations,  partly,  I 
hope,  and  chiefly,  I  hope,  by  support  from  above,  partly  by  being 
busy,  and  partly  by  the  excitement  of  traveling,  and  partly  by  think- 
ing that  our  separation  is,  at  all  events,  over,  and  if  God  spares  us  the 
next  thing  to  look  to  is  meeting.  Continue  to  pray  for  me  that  I  may 
be  enabled  to  redeem  the  time,  to  walk  worthy  of  my  profession, 
and  to  speak  a  word  in   season  on   religious  matters  to   Sellar,   or 


no  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

others  with  whom  I  may  come  in  contact,  and  that  I  may  be  kept 
prudent  as  to  business  and  not  go  too  far  at  low  prices.  My  Uncle 
Alick  will  likely  make  a  mint  of  money  on  the  flour  we  bought  for 
him  in  New  Orleans  ;  we  get  a  good  commission.  So  far  I  really 
seem  to  find  favor  with  those  among  whom  I  go.  I  was  up  this 
morning  a  quarter  to  five,  walked  nearly  a  mile  in  the  dark  to  the 
post  ofifice,  and  then  had  to  trudge  up  and  down  in  front  of  it  for 
three-quarters  of  an  hour  till  it  opened,  in  order  to  send  off  an 
important  letter  to  New  Orleans.  Give  my  kindest  love  to  my  dear 
J.  Walter  and  my  dear  Tot  and  Bessie  and  Harriet,  and  my  little 
Willie — I  fancy  I  see  the  dear  little  fellow  at  church — and  kiss  my 
little  Lady  Helen  for  me.  Oh,  may  God  bless  and  watch  over  you 
all. 

"  I  could  write  on  all  day,  but  I  must  go  and  attend  to  business. 
May  God  unite  us  all  in  health  and  peace.  Since  you  like  to  know 
exactly  how  I  am,  I  am  in  capital  health,  never  better.  I  slept  with 
my  window  open  last  night  and  was  bothered  by  a  mosquito.  You 
did  quite  right  in  giving  the  money  to  Maria,  as  you  do  in  every- 
thing else,  you  dear  one. 

"  Ever  thine  own  attached 

"  Wm.  W." 

"  New  York  Hotel,  Wednesday  Evening,  December  lo,  1845. 
"  My  Beloved  William  : 

"  I  do  indeed  thank  God  for  all  his  mercies  to  you,  my  very  pre- 
cious William,  and  to  me  through  you.  I  have  just  got  your  letter 
from  Charleston,  number  seven.  This  voyage  I  have  been  dreading, 
and  am  so  thankful  that  it  was  safely  and  even  pleasantly  accomplished, 
lam  sure  we  may  well  say  '  Hitherto  hath  the  Lord  helped  us,'  and 
do  not  let  us  ever  distrust  his  goodness  and  wisdom.  If  you  had 
not  remained  those  two  days  in  Washington,  you  might  have  been 
in  one  of  those  railway  trains  that  were  smashed  to  pieces.  I  have 
been  looking  at  the  new  moon  to-night,  and  wondering  whether  you 
had  been  gazing  at  the  same,  and  whether  you  had  at  last  got  out 
of  this  horrid  cold  weather,  sleet  and  snow,  thaw  and  wind 
alternately. 

"I  have  not  been  out  since  Sunday  morning  till  to-day,  owing 
to  the  wet  weather,  and  my  having  a  very  bad  cold  in  the  head — 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW  ORLEANS,   DECEMBER,    1 845.      Ill 

this  seems  going  off  to-night,  and  to-morrow  I  intend  paying 
some  calls,  with  Maria,  on  that  Mrs.  Robinson  whom  we  met  at 
John  Hone's,  Mrs.  David  Cobden,  after  her  ball,  Miss  Kitty  Bridgen, 
and  Anna  Winthrop,  whose  children  have  all  been  ill  of  chicken- 
pox.  Maria  and  Emily  go  to-night  to  Angelica  Livingston's  wed- 
ding. Do  you  remember  we  met  her  in  the  Albany  boat  last  winter  ? 
I  got  your  dear'letter  f rom  Petersburg  on  Monday  afternoon.  It  was 
indeed  most  welcome,  but  I  do  not  wish  you,  my  beloved  one,  to 
sacrifice  needful  rest  asj'<?«  do  a.nd  have  done  {ox  me,  but  write  only 
when  your  body  is  refreshed,  or  if  you  will  write,  let  your  letters, 
when  you  are  tired,  be  shorter  ;  one  page  is  quite  sufficient  to  assure 
me  you  are  well  and  safe,  and  is  enough  till  you  can  write  more 
comfortably. 

"  I  sent  off  letters  from  Europe  and  one  from  Charlotte  and  myself 
last  Sunday  to  you.  I  hope,  as  you  remain  so  long  in  Charleston, 
you  will  get  them  there.  Let  me  know  whether  you  wish  me  to 
send  Mary's,  Anna's,  and  Eliza's  letters  to  you  when  you  are  at 
New  Orleans.  I  wish  you  were  well  there  now  and  at  work,  pre- 
paring to  come  back  to  me  again.  The  children  are  all  well  and 
good,  but  very  noisy  just  now.  Helen  is  on  a  chair  leaning  over 
my  back,  with  a  bright  color,  and  her  long  fair  hair  falling  over  her 
cheeks.  Every  now  and  then  she  catches  hold  of  me  and  kisses 
me  and  says,  '  Now,  mamma,  pese  more,  ne,  ne.'  I  see  she  is  point- 
ing to  some  flowers  Margaret  Hone  brought  me  this  morning 
and  which  are  lying  on  the  table.  Willie  and  Harriet  are  kicking 
up  their  heels  and  sliding  down  off  the  sofa,  making  a  hor- 
rible racket.  Charlotte  sits  at  one  side  of  the  table,  with  her 
hands  over  her  book,  rocking  in  her  chair  backward  and  for- 
ward, studying.  Elizabeth  sits  at  the  other  end  doing  sums 
on  her  slate,  and  J.  Walter  is  at  the  dancing  school.  Charlotte  has 
risen  three  places  higher  in  her  class  at  their  last  review.  Caroline 
Neilson's  child  continues  to  get  better.  She  was  at  Mrs.  A.  B. 
Neilson's  ball  last  night  in  her  black  velvet  dress,  and  white  lace 
scarf  on  her  head.  Her  husband  wanted  to  show  her,  and  also  to 
show  that  although  she  never  went  out,  she  was  worth  being  seen. 
I  think  of  getting  her  a  handsome  inkstand  or  something  for  the 
center  of  her  table,  as  I  proposed  before  you  went  away,  and  also 
getting  a  '  Lady's  Companion,'  or  something  else  pretty  for  Bessie 


112  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Kane,  as  you  desired.  I  think  then,  in  all,  I  shall  have  spent  twenty- 
five  dollars  for  Christmas,  which  is  not  much,  as  it  includes  the 
five  dollars  to  Mary  Smyth,  the  gold-pencil  case  to  Margaret  Law- 
rence, and  the  paper  case  to  Harriet  Mills,  including,  of  course, 
some  eight  to  ten  dollars  for  these  gifts  to  C.  Neilson  and  Bessie 
Kane. 

"  I  shall  have  a  grand  display  for  Christmas  in  my  own  little 
family,  and  not  much  money  spent  on  them.  The  display  is  to  be 
made  in  my  bedroom,  on  the  large  dining  table,  at  9.30  a.  m.,  and 
Margaret  Hone,  Jane  Hone,  Harriet  Mills,  and  Maria  are  coming  to 
see  it.  Then  we  elder  ones  go  to  church,  and  after  church  to  Anna 
Winthrop's  to  spend  the  day,  she  being  very  anxious  to  have  us,  and 
there  being  other  children  there  makes  our  children  more  anxious 
to  go  than  to  Maria's.  John  Walter  has  just  returned  and  says 
Aunt  Anna  was  at  dancing  scItooI,  and  all  the  children.  They  have 
had  the  measles,  but  it  is  very  slightly,  and  they  are  all  now  quite 
well.  I  have  thought  a  great  deal  of  dear  Mary  and  her  husband. 
Do  not  forget  to  pray  for  her,  my  darling,  as  she  has  asked  you  to 
do  so. 

"  Have  you  found  out  yet  if  Sellar  has  a  Bible  ?  If  not,  make  him 
a  present  of  one  at  Christmas,  and  if  you  are  not  in  a  good  place  to 
get  one  at  Christmas  get  one  for  New  Year's. 

"  Mr.  De  Peyster  was  highly  pleased  that  you  found  his  friend 
Carter  Lee  agreeable.  He  came  here  last  evening  and  left  Maria 
with  me  and  called  for  her  again.  She  was  here  also  in  the  morning  ; 
also  Julia  Mills,  the  day  before  C.  Neilson  and  Margaret  Lawrence 
were  here.  Mr.  De  Peyster  spoke  to  Mr.  B.  H.  Field  about  mention- 
ing me  to  Captain  Comstock  [the  lessee  of  the  New  York  Hotel. — 
W.  W.]  and  the  consequence  is  that  we  had  so  marked  a  change  in 
our  breakfast  and  dinner,  and  in  the  attention  of  Reynolds,  the 
chambermaid,  and  Mr.  Whitman,  that  both  I  and  the  children  were 
noticing  it  before  we  knew  the  cause.  Samuel,  the  waiter,  has 
broken  my  blue  glass  card  case  into  three  pieces.  I  sent  it  to  be 
riveted,  but  know  not  how  it  will  look. 

"  I  am  reading  the  chapter  in  John  every  day.  I  suppose  you  do 
the  same,  and  at  night  I  read  the  same  Psalm  with  you,  having 
begun  at  the  beginning  on  the  Friday  after  you  left.  I  do  not  intend 
to  see  company  on  New  Year's  Day  ;  the  expense  of  liqueurs  and 


ON   MY   WAY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS,  DECEMBER,    1845.      ^S 

cake  would  be  a  great  deal,  and  it  would  be  very  fatiguing.  They  do 
not  give  port  and  sherry,  but  three  or  four  sorts  of  liqueurs,  cherry 
brandy,  etc.,  plum  cake  and  New  Year's  cake.  Maria  had  invited  me 
to  go  there  without  the  children,  and  Aunt  Catherine  Beekman  has 
invited  me  to  go  ivith  the  children.  I  should  not  like  to  leave  the 
poor  things  moping  at  home  alone,  and  to  take  any  of  them  would 
be  decidedly  too  many  in  the  room.  If  Anna  Winthrop  do  not  see 
company  I  may  go  there  and  stay  till  the  calling  hours  are  over. 
If  she  do  I  will  just  say  that  Mrs.  Wood  does  not  see  company. 
Brodhead  called  here  the  other  night,  and  Lawrie  again,  did  I  tell 
you  ?  The  latter  I  saw  and  think  I  shall  have  to  let  in  others  occa- 
sionally too,  if  they  call  more  than  once,  as  it  may  look  rude  not  to 
do  so,  and  I  cannot  always  say  I  am  ill  or  engaged.  Dear  Willie 
was  heard  praying  for  you  the  other  night  all  alone  in  his  bed  in  the 
dark.  He  said  :  '  Oh  !  my  Father  in  heaven,  send  our  other  dear 
father  safe  home,'  to  which  prayer  we  all  say  Amen  ! 

"With  kind  love  to  Sellar  from  me  and  the  children,  believe  me, 
my  own  wandering  Willie, 

"Thine  own  fond  "  H. 

"I  have  read  the  President's  Message  and  think  it  well  written, 
but  very  ivarlike  ;  also  one  or  two  war  articles  in  the  Edinburgh." 


CHAPTER  VII. 

JOURNEY    TO    NEW    ORLEANS    CONCLUDED,    ARRIVING    THERE 
DECEMBER    31,     1845. 

"  No.  74,  Pulaski  Hotel,  Savannah,  Ga., 

"Friday,  December  12,  1845. 
"  My  Sweet  Wife  : 

"  I  left  Charleston  yesterday  at  9  a.  m.  in  a  very  neat  little  steamer 
called  the  William  Seabrook,  a  complete  contrast  to  the  Wilmington 
boat,  everything  in  the  Seabrook  being  as  neat  and  clean  as  possible, 
and  at  dinner  there  were  two  tablecloths,  one  of  which  was  taken 
off  before  the  sweets  came,  and  both  as  white  as  driven  snow.  In 
the  boat  were  Mr.  Mitchell  King  and  his  two  daughters,  and  several 
other  ladies  and  gentlemen  ;  among  the  latter  Mr.  Huger  (pro- 
nounced Ugee),  at  the  house  of  whose  father,  or  grandfather, 
Lafayette  begged  for  admittance  the  first  night  he  landed  from  his 
French  ship  to  join  the  American  revolutionary  force.  We  went  by 
what  is  called  the  Outer  Passage  for  about  five  hours,  and  had  the 
whole  swell  of  the  Atlantic,  and  we  rolled  about  famously  ;  for- 
tunately the  wind  was  in  our  favor.  After  this  we  went  the  rest  of 
the  way  by  the  Inner  Passage,  which  is  a  sort  of  salt-water  canal  or 
river,  running  between  the  mainland  and  the  Sea  Islands  on  which 
the  celebrated  cotton  is  grown,  and  which  lie  all  along  the  coast 
from  Charleston  to  Florida.  The  sail  between  them  is  something 
like  that  between  Hunter's  Islands  near  New  Rochelle,  only  that  the 
Sea  Islands  are  composed  of  sand  and  gravel,  covered  with  trees  and 
plantations,  instead  of  being  rocky  like  Hunter's  Islands.  The  canal 
or  river  winds  about  very  prettily,  and  is,  of  course,  quite  calm  ;  so 
that  the  voyage  was  very  pleasant,  excepting  that  the  weather  was 
cold.  We  stopped  at  Beaufort  (pronounced  Bewfort)  to  land  pas- 
sengers and  freight.  I  walked  ashore  and  found  plenty  of  orange 
and  lemon  trees  in  full  bearing,  and  also  fig  trees  with  unripe  figs 
still  on  them.     Beaufort  is  a  mere  place  of  residence  for  planters. 


JOURNEY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS   CONCLUDED.  II5 

and  has  no  trade  ;    it  is  on  an  island.     We  arrived  at   Savannah 
about  9  p.  M.  in  the  midst  of  a  deluge  of  rain,  so  that  in  going  from 
the  steamer  to  the  hotel  my  carpetbag  got  wet.     The  streets  are  all 
in  puddles  of  water.     I  have  not  been  out  yet,  and  I  shall  write  this 
until  about  ten,  when  it  will  be  time  to  go  and  pay  my  business  calls. 
The  rain  is  good  for  us,  inasmuch  as  it  will  probably  raise  the  water 
in  the  Chattalioochee  River,  and  enable  us  to  go  down  by  steamer  to 
Appalachicola,  instead  of  staging  it  from  Columbus.     So  Providence 
watches   over  us  !     By  the  way,  I  forgot  to  tell  you  that  the  day 
before   I   left  Charleston  we  dined  at  Mr.  Thomas  Aston  Coffin's. 
The  only  person  besides  ourselves  was  a  Mr.  Goudin.      Mrs.  Coffin 
is  a  very  pleasant  woman,  something  like  your  sister  Charlotte,  but 
taller,  with   fine  black  eyes   and    superb  eyebrows,   but  somewhat 
passe'e.     AVe  had  dinner  in  a  remarkably  neat  room  at  a  round  table  ; 
capital  soup,  fish,  wild  turkey,  venison,  and  sweetmeats,  everything 
admirably  cooked  and  hot.     More  like  an  English  dinner  than  any- 
thing I  have  seen  in  America.     Both  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Coffin  have  been 
in  England,  and  she  prefers  it  to  America.     The  champagne,  sherry, 
and  madeira  would,  as  Maria  says,   '  make  your  hair  curl.'     After 
dinner  we  went  to  Mr.  Mitchell  King's,  whose  house  is  very  hand- 
some and  comfortable.     I  hear  that  his  name  was  originally  Michael 
King  ;  that  he  left  Crail  to  become  a  teacher,  was  wrecked  on  his 
way  out  to  the  United  States,  found  his  way  to  Charleston,  studied 
law,  and  has  become  a  leading  lawyer.     From  his  house  we  went  to 
Dr.  Bachman's  to  attend  a  club  which  met  at  his  house  that  evening. 
He  is  employed  jointly  with  Audubon  in  bringing  out  a  large  illus- 
trated work  on  the  quadrupeds  of  America,  and  he  gave  us  a  sort  of 
address  on  the  subject,  showing  the  difficulty  (or  'bother,'  as  he 
called  it)  and  expense  that  had  to  be  encountered  in  giving  accurate 
descriptions.      '  And  after  all,'   said  he,  '  our  books  are  necessarily 
so  expensive  that  those  who  would  read   them  can't  afford   to  buy 
them,  and  those  who  can  afford  to  buy  them  won't  read.'     His  dis- 
course, which  he  delivered  sitting  and  quite  colloquially,  was  inter- 
esting,  because  it  was  illustrated  by  drawings  made  by  Audubon. 
John  Walter  would  have  enjoyed  it.     By  the  by,  there  is  not  a  single 
rabbit  (native)  in  all  North  America,  but  plenty  of  hares.     I  had 
thought  that  the  reverse  was  the  case.     Rabbits  burrow  ;  hares  s^i/at 
Dr.  Bachman  is  a  temperance  man,  but  gave  us  a  very  nice  supper  ; 


Il6  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

he  is  a  kind-hearted  enthusiast,  like  Martin  Luther  in  appearance, 
and  of  German  extraction.  We  got  home  at  10.30,  after  which  I  had 
to  pack  up  my  things,  and  as  I  wrote  you  I  was  up  at  4.45  a.  m. 
Well,  there  was  a  note  to  me,  as  I  read  it,  from  Mr.  Menlofie,  asking 
me  to  take  a  package  of  gold  to  New  Orleans.  I  thought  it  was  a 
bore,  but  wrote  a  note,  saying  it  would  afford  me  pleasure,  etc.,  and 
sent  the  note  to  the  bar  to  be  delivered  to  Mr.  Menlone.  Yesterday 
morning  Mr.  Trenholm  came  to  the  boat  to  see  us  off,  and  asked  if  I 
had  got  his  note,  and  if  the  gold  had  been  sent  down.  I  said  : 
'  Your  note  !  No  ;  I  got  a  note  from  Mr.  Menlone,  asking  me  to 
take  gold.'  '  No,'  says  Sellar,  'it  was  from  Mr.  Trenholm.'-  '  Then,' 
said  I,  '  I  answered  it  to  Mr.  Menlone,  who,  when  he  gets  it,  will 
think  I  am  cracked.'  This  caused  a  great  laugh,  and  Mr.  Trenholm 
said  :  '  I  must  tell  Tom  Coffin  how  his  champagne  affected  you.'  It 
did  certainly  look  as  if  champagne  had  got  into  my  head,  but  it  was 
not  so.  I  was  as  sober  as  a  judge,  and  had  been  at  two  houses  after 
dinner,  and  listened  for  an  hour  and  a  half  to  a  discourse  on  natural 
history  ;  but  I  was  sleepy  and  tired,  and  merely  glanced  at  the  note 
and  fancied  Trenholm  was  Menlone.  I  confess  that  there  is  mighty 
little  resemblance  between  the  two  names.  I  am  just  as  well  pleased  to 
be  rid  of  the  gold,  however  (probably  ten  or  twenty  thousand  dollars 
on  account  of  tlie  Bank  of  Charleston),  and  we  might  have  got  robbed 
ot  it,  which  would  have  been  awkward.  I  was  much  annoyed  at  my 
mistake,  but  still  could  not  help  laughing,  especially  when  I  thought 
of  Menlone  getting  my  note.  I  asked  Trenholm  to  explain  to  him 
the  mistake  I  had  made. 

"December  12,  1845,7.45  p.m.  We  have  just  returned  from 
dining  with  Mr.  Robert  Hutchison  [our  Savannah  agent],  who 
lives  in  a  capital  house  and  good  style.  You  know  his  wife 
and  children  were  lost  at  sea  in  a  steamer  between  Savannah 
and  New  York  ;  but  his  mother-in-law,  a  Mrs.  Bullock,  and 
her  daughter  by  her  first  husband,  a  Miss  Elliot,  are  staying 
with  him.  In  the  course  of  conversation  it  came  out  that  the 
only  two  religious  books  that  they  liked  were  Jay's  '  Exercises  ' 
and  the  '  Life  of  Mrs.  Isabella  Graham,'  so  I  told  them  of  '  The  Life 
of  Dr.  Arnold '  and  Goode's  '  Better  Covenant.'  On  Sunday  we 
have  arranged  to  go  with  them  to  an  Independent  church  here,  the 
minister  of  which  is  said  to  be  a  good  one.     To-morrow  w^e  dine  at 


JOURNEY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS   CONCLUDED.  11/ 

Mr.  Low's,  and  on  Sunday  we  leave  this  at  ii  p.  m.,  which  is  the 
same  as  starting  on  Monday  morning  early.  I  would  have  gone  to- 
morrow night,  but,  besides  making  us  travel  on  Sunday,  there  is  no 
train  leaves  on  Saturday.  This  must  be  a  beautiful  place  in  sum- 
mer ;  even  now  it  looks  very  pretty.  It  is  all  laid  out  in  streets  and 
squares,  every  alternate  block  being  an  open  square,  and  the  streets 
are  lined  with  trees,  most  of  which  are  even  now  in  full  leaf. 

"  Give  my  kind  love  to  Maria  and  Mr.  De  Peyster  when  you  see 
them,  and  may  God  bless  you  and  my  dear  children  and  unite  us  all 
in  health  and  happiness.  I  shall  try  and  send  you  a  few  lines  from 
this  on  Sunday.  This  letter  goes  to-night  by  a  steamer  to  Charles- 
ton, and  will  reach  you  as  soon  as  the  mail  which  leaves  this  to-mor- 
row night.      God  bless  and  protect  you  I 

"  Ever  your  own  attached 

"  Wm.  W." 

"Savannah,  Ga.,  Sunday,  December  14,  1845. 
*'  My  Dearest  Love  : 

"  I  am  much  disappointed  at  not  receiving  a  letter  from  you  to- 
day, and  also  my  English  letters  by  the  steamer  of  November  19, 
which  I  had  expected  to  receive  in  Charleston,  and  made  sure  they 
would  reach  me  here.  I  know,  my  dearest  one,  that  it  is  no  fault  of 
yours  that  I  have  not  heard  from  you,  but  probably  my  own,  as  I 
believe  I  did  not  name  Savannah  among  the  places  I  was  to  be 
addressed  at.  I  am  in  hopes  I  may  get  these  English  letters,  and 
one  from  your  dear,  sweet  self  at  Columbus,  which,  as  we  intend 
stopping  a  day  at  Macon,  we  shall  not  reach  before  Wednesday, 
17th  inst. 

"  I  sent  off  my  last  from  this  late  in  the  evening  of  the  12th  inst. 
Yesterday  was  a  cold,  bleak,  cloudy  day,  but  without  rain.  I 
arranged  some  business  matters,  and  walked  all  over  the  town,  which 
in  summer,  from  the  long  double  lines  of  trees  in  the  streets,  must 
really  be  very  pretty.  At  3  p.  m.  we  went  to  drive  with  Mr.  Andrew 
Low,  Jr.  He  is  a  man  of  about  thirty-two  years,  Scotch  by  birth, 
but  married  to  a  Savannah  lady — quite  a  pleasant  woman,  and  a 
little  like  Helen  Kane.  There  was  also  a  Miss  Hunter  there — rather 
pretty — a  Mr.  Hamilton,  and  Mr.  Crowder  of  Liverpool,  who  is  now 
established   here   in   partnership  with   Mr.    Hamilton.     Crowder  is 


Il8  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

very  good-looking  and  gentlemanly,  but  with  a  Jewish  face,  how- 
ever, not  unlike  his  sister   Caroline.     He  is  the  eldest  son,  and  talks 
as  if  he  were  a  pretty  wild  fellow.     His  brother  (J.  Walter's  friend), 
he  says,  has  grown  very  tall,  and  is  studying  surgery  with  Mr.  Bain- 
brigge.     The  Listers  still  live  next  door  to  our  old  house.     Lister's 
father  is  dead.     It  seems  that  at  one  time  it  was  proposed  to  knock 
down  Crowder's  house,  and  run  a  street   through  it  and  the  garden, 
with  small   houses  on  each  side,  but  the  idea  has  since  been  aban- 
doned, owing  to  its  being  found   that   too  many  small  houses  had 
been  built  already.     Crowder  left  on  October  4,  and  came  out  in  the 
same  steamer  as  the  Spencers.     He  may  possibly  be  in  New  Orleans 
this  winter.     I  asked  him  to  come  and  see  me,  which  appeared  to 
gratify  him.     This  is  a  drenching,  wet,  muggy  day,  which  is  a  great 
pity,  as  I  would  like  to  have  seen   Savannah  in  good  weather.     I 
was  at  the  Presbyterian  church  this  morning,  which  is  very  large 
and  handsome.     Congregation  small,  but  respectable.     Singing  and 
organ  playing  beautiful,  and  two  of  the  hymns  also  beautiful,  but 
the  sermon  worse  than  '  bosh.'     It  was  not  the  regular  minister,  but 
a  Methodist,  a  Dr.  Pearce,  I  believe.     The  text  was  '  Whether  you 
eat  or  drink,'  etc.,  and   the  sermon  the  most  Arminian  I  ever  heard, 
so  much  so  that  I  neither  rose  at  the  last  prayer  nor  blessing.     He 
said  we  were  to  carry  our  religion  into  all  our  acts,  not  only  into 
those  which,  in  common  parlance,  were  called  religious.     This  was 
all  very  well,  but  then,  as  far  as  his  words  went,  it  appeared  that  we 
could  only  gain  heaven,  and  were  certain  of  gaining  heaven,  if, 
whether  we  ate  or  drank,  we  did  all  to  the  glory  of  God.     Now,  if 
that  be  true,  there  is  no  hope  for  any  poor  guilty  sinner  like  me, 
either  here  or  hereafter.     But  thanks  be   to  God  that  while  I   was 
yet  a  great  way  off   my  Father  saw  me  and  had  compassion  on  me, 
and  laid  my  help  upon  One  who  was  mighty  to  save,  and  neither  Dr. 
Pearce  nor  any  other  doctor  can  pluck  me  out  of  his  hand. 

"  '  Oh,  how  unlike  the  complex  works  of  man 
Heaven's  easy,  artless,  unencumbered  plan  ! ' 

"  It  will  please  you  to  know  that  I  had  three  separate  invitations 
to  dinner  to-day,  and  declined  all — the  two  first  on  the  ground  that 
I  never  went  out  on  Sunday,  and  Sellar  declined  the  third  for  me 
on  the  same  plea.     I  have  just  dined,  and  I  am  now  going  to  after- 


JOURNEY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS  CONCLUDED.  II9 

noon   church,  and   I  hope    I    may   have  better   luck   than   in   the 
morning. 

"  6.45  p.  M.  The  afternoon  was,  and  is,  very  wet.  Only  about 
25  people  in  a  church  that  would  hold  2500.  The  sermon  was  very 
poor. 

"By  the  way,  I  find  that  I  had  carefully  put  in  my  pocketbook  the 
agreement  about  the  rooms  in  the  New  York  Hotel,  which  I  now 
inclose,  and  which  please  take  care  not  to  lose. 

"I  was  glad  you  sent  the  gold  piece  as  a  Christmas  gift  to  Mary 
Smyth.  I  believe  I  omitted  to  say  so  in  my  last.  I  only  wish  we 
were  able  to  send  more  in  the  same  direction.  Tom  Sellar  is  dining 
with  Mr.  Francis  Wood,  and  so  I  am  '  awn-an-ony '  as  wee  Helen 
says.  Kiss  the  dear  little  pet  for  me.  I  just  think  I  see  the  way  she 
drops  her  eyelids  when  she  is  pretending  to  be  Mrs.  Caudle,  with  a 
towel  for  a  sheet,  and  laid  out  full  length.  And  my  dear  little 
Willie  and  Harrie  and  Bessie  and  Charlotte,  and  Willie's  '  big 
brother,'  and  your  dear,  blessed  self  are  all  before  my  mental  vision. 
We  may  probably  stay  a  day  at  Macon.  My  next  will  not  be  written 
until  I  reach  Columbus,  and  will  probably  not  reach  you  for  a  week 
after  this.     God  have  us  all  in  his  holy  keeping. 

"  Ever  thine  own 

"Wm.  W." 

"  No.  57,  Floyd  House,  Macon,  Ga., 

"  Monday,  December  15,  1845. 
"  Mv  Blessed  Wife  : 

"  I  sent  No.  11  to  the  post  ofiRce  at  Savannah  last  night  at  seven, 
and  then  lay  down  on  the  top  of  my  bed  in  my  dressing  gown,  not 
feeling  well,  which  was  anything  but  pleasant  in  anticipation  of 
a  night  journey  of  190  miles  when  it  was  raining  cats  and 
dogs.  However,  I  was  determined  to  '  go  thorough,'  as  Arch- 
bishop Laud  said  he  would  do,  and  lost  his  head  in  consequence, 
and  at  ten  I  went  and  took  a  supper  of  ham  sandwiches,  and  on 
the  top  of  that  a  good  jorum  of  hot  brandy  toddy,  which  did  me  a 
deal  of  good.  At  11  p.  m,  we  set  off  for  the  railway  in  an  omnibus, 
the  rain  pouring  pitchforks,  and  I  got  my  baggage  all  wet.  The  car 
was  the  neatest  and  cleanest  I  have  seen  south  of  New  York,  and,  as 
there  were  only  a  few  passengers,  each  of  us  had  an  entire  seat,  but 


120  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

perhaps  we  were  not  so  contented  as  if  we  had  been  less  sated 
with  luxury,  for  each  man  tried  to  lie  at  full  length  on  his  little  seat 
instead  of  sitting  bolt  upright,  as  he  would  need  to  do  if  the  cars 
had  been  full,  and  trying  to  lie  out  made  us  painfully  sensible  that 
we  were  not  in  bed,  and  inclined  to  grumble  because  our  rose  leaf 
of  whole  seat  was  crumpled.  For  myself,  I  was  as  restless  as  '  a  cub 
bear,'  as  they  say  in  Virginia.  However,  hard  traveling  does  me 
good,  and  after  washing  in  the  open'air  inYront  of  the  station,  with 
brown  soap  in  a  tin  basin,  and  in  a  pour  of  rain,  I  was  as  fresh  as 
a  lark  and  perfectly  well,  whereas  poor  Sellar  felt  as  if  he  had  been 
pounded  to  atoms.  We  dined  at  half  past  one,  and  have  since 
delivered  our  letters  here  and  seen  sundry  business  people.  We 
intend  to  start  for  Columbus  to-morrow  at  noon  by  stage,  and  will 
travel  all  that  night,  reaching  Columbus,  'I  believe,  at  7  A.  M.  on 
Wednesday,  and  how  long  we  will  remain  there  will  depend  upon 
the  state  of  the  Chattahoochee  River.  By  the  way,  this  place  is  situ- 
ated— and  rather  prettily  situated — on  the  Ocmulgee  River.  It  is 
a  straggling  Southern  town,  with  some  handsome  private  residences. 
The  country  is  undulating,  and  from]  the  upper  part  of  the  town 
there  is  a  very  pretty  and  extensive  view  over  a  thickly  wooded 
country,  chiefly  pine,  although  I  have  seen  cypress,  palmetto,  and 
canebrake,  which  are  indications  of  a  southern  climate.  We  are 
here  farther  north  than  Savannah  ;  about  as  far  north  as  Charles- 
ton. The  weather  is  very  cold,  with  a  strong  gale  from  northwest, 
but  no  frost.  The  rain  is  over,  which  is  a  comfort.  A  small  gale 
blows  into  my  room  through  the  window,  but  I  have  a  rousing 
wood  fire  of  pitch  pine  and  hickory.  The  wood  depot  for  this  part 
of  the  house  is  just  outside  my  door,  so  I  don't  fail  to  help  myself, 
and  shall  just  go  and  put  on  a  good  whopping  log  now,  and  a  fine 
blaze  it  will  make.  Tom  Sellar  always  comes  and  sits  in  my  bed- 
room, and  is  writing  beside  me  now.  Do  you  know  anything  of 
Gouverneur  Wilkins  ?  He  was  introduced  to  me  on  the  way  to 
Philadelphia  by  Isaac  Hone,  and  I  met  him  again  at  Savannah.  A 
Mr.  Dehon,  brother  of  the  ladies  we  met  at  Saratoga,  came  with  us 
from  Savannah,  and  is  now  in  this  house,  but  I  have  not  spoken  to 
him. 

"  I  fancy  you  will  get  this  about  Monday  next,  and  I  trust  that  it  will 
find  you  and  all  my  dear  ones  quite  well.     That  will  be  Christmas 


JOURNEY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS   CONCLUDED.  121 

week,  and  dear  John  Walter  will  be  leaving  for  Philadelphia  the 
Friday  after.  Mr.  Kane's  house  is  corner  of  Locust  and  Schuylkill 
Seventh.  He  had  better  get  a  cab  when  he  lands,  which  will  cost  him 
about  one  dollar,  but  it  can't  be  helped  ;  and  don't  let  Tom  Kane 
pay  for  anything  for  him  if  he  can  help  it,  so  let  him  have  several 
half  and  quarter  dollars  in  his  waistcoat  pocket  ready  to  produce  on 
the  instant. 

"As  my  dear  Charlotte  and  Bessie  have  done  so  well  at  school,  I 
wish  you  would  give  Charlotte  from  me  a  $2.50  gold  piece,  Bessie  $1 
in  silver,  Harrie,  who  has  also  done  well  according  to  her  metier, 
50  cents  in  silver,  Willie  25  cents  in  silver,  and  little  Helen  the  same, 
all  on  Christmas  Day,  to  do  what  they  like  with.  John  Walter's 
jaunt  is  to  be  his  Christmas  gift  from  me.  God  bless  us  all.  Good- 
night.    I    will   finish    this   in    the   morning,  as    the   mail  closes  at 

9.30  A.  M. 

"  December  16,  1845,  8.30  a.  m.  I  was  up  by  6.30  a.  m.,  and  kin- 
dled my  own  fire  in  a  most  beautiful  and  scientific  manner,  and,  hav- 
ing plenty  of  logs,  made  a  blaze  that  would  have  roasted  an  ox.  This 
is  a  clear,  cold  day,  and  we  start  about  12.30  p.  m.  for  Columbus,  dis- 
tant about  130  miles.  I  suppose  it  will  be  the  roughest  portion  of 
our  journey.  Poor  Sellar  could  get  nothing  fit  to  eat  at  breakfast 
to-day,  but  I  did  pretty  well.  I  would  like  to  have  Fred.  Foster 
here  praising  his  country  and  inwardly  cursing  the  pork  and  greasy 
'chicken  fixin's,'  which  he  was  compelled  to  swallow  as  a  good  pa- 
triot without  a  murmur.  The  rough  traveling  agrees  with  me  bodily 
and  mentally..  It  will  probably  be  four  or  five  days  before  you 
receive  another  letter  from  me.  God  bless  you  and  my  dear  chil- 
dren, and  unite  us  all  in  health  and  peace  of  mind. 

"  Ever  thine  own  "Wm.  W." 

"  No.  23,  Oglethorpe  Hotel,  Columbus,  Ga., 

"Wednesday,  December  17,  1845. 
"  My  Beloved  Wife  : 

"  I  wrote  to  you  yesterday  from  Macon,  and  at  12.30  p.  m.  we  started 
for  this  place  in  a  four-horse  stage,  carrying  nine  inside  passengers. 
We  supped  at  6.30  p.  m.  yesterday  near  the  Flint  River,  which  said 
river  we  crossed  in  a  big  square  scow,  on  which  we  drove  coach  and 
all.     We  had  to  get  out  thrice  in  the  night  to  walk  over  bad  bits. 


122  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Most  fortunately  it  was  clear  moonlight,  and  the  rain  was  all  gone  ; 
had  it  been  raining,  our  baggage  would  have  been  wet  through,  and 
instead  of  getting  here  b}-^  7  a.  m.  (ninety-five  miles)  it  would  prob- 
ably have  been  2  or  3  p.  m.  After  breakfast  I  washed  from  top  to 
toe  in  cold  water,  and  felt  perfectly  well,  only  sleepy.  I  have  writ- 
ten two  long  business  letters,  have  been  all  over  the  town  looking 
at  cotton  and  seeing  a  cotton  mill,  and  have  still  to  write  a  few  lines 
to  Mary  Ferguson,  and  perhaps  to  Cross,  for  the  steamer  of  Jan- 
uary I,  as  it  will  be  too  late  to  write  for  her  when  we  reach  Appa- 
lachicola.  We  intend  to  leave  for  that  place  to-morrow  afternoon 
per  steamer  Augusta.  It  will  take  us  two  days,  the  distance  being 
four  hundred  miles  down  the  Chattahoochee,  which  is  really  a  pretty 
stream,  running  here  between  high  banks  and  over  a  rocky  bed. 
There  are  great  rapids  just  at  this  town,  giving  the  inhabitants 
thereof  an  '  almighty  water  privilege,'  of  which  they  have  availed 
themselves  to  erect  sawmills  and  a  cotton  mill  and  power-loom 
factory,  worked  by  white  labor.  The  superintendent  of  the  factory 
told  me  they  wanted  no  tariff,  and  could  get  on  perfectly  well  with- 
out it  ;  that  no  manufacturer  in  Georgia  wanted  it  ;  on  the  contrary, 
all  they  wanted  was  to  be  let  alone.  I  clapped  him  on  the  shoulder 
and  said  I  rejoiced  to  hear  such  '  noble  sentiments.'  Just  tell  this 
about  the  tariff  to  Mr.  De  Peyster  and  friend  Foster.  I  found  out 
about  their  profits  and  all  the  rest  of  it  ;  but  that  would  not  in- 
terest you.  But  if  it  would,  is  it  not  written  in  the  '  Book  of  the 
Chronicles  of  My  Travels '  ? 

"  The  Chattahoochee  is  spanned  by  a  very  long  wooden  bridge, 
supported  by  two  stone  piers,  and  is  navigable  for  large  steamers 
to  just  below  the  bridge.  This  river  is  the  dividing  line  between 
Georgia  and  Alabama.  I  saw  many  male  and  female  slaves  for 
sale  to-day.  One  I  was  really  sorry  for.  She  was  more  than 
half  white,  had  on  black  silk  mits,  a  well-made  printed  gown  and 
Leghorn  hat,  and  not  woolly  hair  ;  she  seemed  sad  and  dejected, 
and  might  be  about  twenty.  I  saw  a  great  big  regular  negress 
stand  up  while  an  intending  purchaser  felt  her  arms  and  made  her 
show  her  foot,  or  rather  kicked  her  petticoat  away  from  it.  She 
did  not  appear  to  feel  the  degradation,  but  the  punching  a  fellow- 
creature  like  a  horse  made  me  shiver  all  over,  and  makes  me  feel 
quite  uncomfortable  yet. 


JOURNEY  TO   NEW   ORLEANS   CONCLUDED.  1 23 

"  I  was  horridly  disappointed  and  triste  at  getting  no  letters  from 
you  here  to-day  ;  however,  I  may  get  them  to-morrow  ;  if  not,  then  I 
won't  get  them  till  I  reach  New  Orleans,  and  when  that  may  be  I 
can't  tell-:  I  may  find  no  opportunity  direct  from  Appalachicola,  but 
be  obliged  to  come  up  here  again  and  go  from  this  by  Montgomery 
to  Mobile  and  thence  to  New  Orleans. 

"  December  18,  1845.  Your  dear  letter  of  the  7th  and  my  sweet 
little  Charlotte's  of  the  6th  inst.  have  just  reached  me  this  morning, 
and  delighted  and  thankful  I  am  that  you  are  all  keeping  so  well. 
Getting  my  business  letters  at  the  same  time,  I  have  scarcely  been 
able  to  digest  yours  and  Charlotte's  yet. 

"  Did  Mr.  Dawson  tell  you  how  nearly  D.  &  Co.  had  been  cheated 
out  of  eight  thousand  dollars  by  C.  Brugiere's  partner  ?  If  he  has 
not,  say  nothing  about  it  to  him  or  anyone  else.  Fortunately,  and 
thanks  to  Dawson's  firmness,  they  (D.  &  Co.)  escaped  without  loss, 

"I  don't  think  the  steamer  will  leave  this  until  to-morrow,  but  I 
must  close  now  for  to-day's  mail.  If  you  don't  hear  from  me  within 
two  days  after  getting  this,  you  may  not  hear  from  me  for  ten  days, 
as  the  mails  from  Appalachicola  are  very  irregular. 

"  God  forever  bless  you  and  my  darling  children.  Dear  Char- 
lotte's letter  pleased  me  very  much.  May  God  in  his  mercy  unite 
us  all  again  in  health  of  body  and  mind. 

"  Ever  thine  own  attached 

"Wm.  W." 

"Columbus,  Ga.,  December  18,  1845. 
"  My  Blessed  Harriet  : 

"  I  have  written  to  you  already  to-day,  but,  having  just  finished 
two  business  letters  and  one  to  Cross,  I  sit  down  to  send  you  a  few 
lines,  as  it  will  probably  be  a  long  time  before  you  hear  from  me 
again,  the  mails  from  Appalachicola  being  so  irregular. 

"We  are  to  go  on  board  the  steamer  Augusta  to-morrow  morning 
before  breakfast,  and  she  is  advertised  to  start  at  8  a.  m.  She  is 
not  quite  so  large  as  the  Wabash  Valley,  but  a  nice  enough  boat.  I 
suppose  Sellar  and  I  will  be  the  only  passengers.  After  dinner  to- 
day we  strolled  down  the  banks  of  the  river  about  a  mile  and  a  half  ; 
the  walk  was  really  beautiful,  and  the  river  quite  picturesque  ;  the 
weather  also  has  cleared    up    delightfully,  and    is  warm.      Sellar 


124  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

desires  me  to  tell  Charlotte  that  he  saw  two  square  rooms  at  Mr. 
Hutchison's  at  Savannah,  but  they  were  too  square.  By  the  way, 
I  wish  you  would  write  on  a  separate  sheet  from  the  children,  as  I 
like  to  keep  your  letters  distinct,  and  when  writing  is  crossed,  I  can't 
see  how  the  children  write.  I  am  glad  that  you  found  Aunt  Patty's* 
conversation  did  you  good,  but,  if  it  please  God,  I  hope  that  for  the 
future  'nought  but  death  shall  part  thee  and  me.' 

"  You  don't  tell  me  how  Captain  Comstock  f  treats  you  compared 
with  Billings,  and  how  you  are  getting  on  in  respect  to  '  meats  and 
drinks  and  divers  washings.' 

"  You  know  how  Mr.  Hutchison,  who  dined  with  us,  praised  Anna 
and  Cross.  He  also  sent  them  either  one  or  two  barrels  of  apples, 
and  when  I  dined  with  him  in  Savannah,  he  spoke  of  sending  Cross 
a  present  of  two  dozen  '  very  particular  madeira,'  of  which  he  had 
given  us  a  bottle  when  he.  was  in  Liverpool.  He  told  me  of  a  cer- 
tain arrangement  which  Cross  had  made  for  doing  his  business, 
which  he  (Hutchison)  thought  extremely  '  liberal,'  but  which  I 
thought  was  extremely  soft.  I  wrote  to  Cross  to  ask  if  he  could 
possibly  have  made  it.  The  reply  came  to-day  that  Hutchison  had 
entirely  mistaken  Cross  if  he  supposed  anything  of  the  sort,  sol  had 
to  write  to  Hutchison  and  tell  him  this,  and  I  could  not  help  laugh- 
ing when  I  did  it  to  think  how  he  will  be  '  stumped'  when  he  finds 
he  has  been  laboring  under  a  delusion,  and  that  his  apples  have  been 
as  good  as  thrown  away.  I  only  hope  he  may  have  sent  Cross  the 
madeira  before  he  gets  my  letter  !  This  shows  that  all  business 
arrangements  should  be  made  in  writing  to  prevent  mistakes.  But 
for  my  letter  to  Cross  the  business  would  probably  have  been  gone 
into,  and  then  when  it  was  finished  there  would  have  been  a  row 
with  Hutchison  about  the  terms. 

"  Fortunately,  nothing  has  been  done,  but  it  is  rather  disgusting 
that  I  should  have  the  task  of  dissipating  Hutchison's  pleasant 
dreams.  Cross  ought  to  have  written  direct  to  him  as  I  told  him  in 
my  letter  to-day.     Don't  say  anything  about  this  to  anyone. 

"It  is  now  8.15  p.  M.  Sellar  and  I  are  sitting  in  my  bedroom 
at  two  little  tables,  each  with  a  candle  and  my  small  ink  bottle  in 
common.    The  embers  of  a  wood  fire  are  dying  on  the  hearth.    There 

*  Mrs.  David  Codwise,    formerly  Patty  Livingston, 
f  Landlord  of  the  New  York  Hotel. 


JOURNEY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS   CONCLUDED.  1 25 

are  two  four-posted  beds  in  the  room  without  curtains.  By  the  way, 
as  soon  as  one  gets  to  Richmond  he  finds  himself  in  the  country 
of  four-posted  bedsteads.  We  have  not  seen  a  French  bedstead 
since  we  reached  it. 

"  Why  didn't  you  send  Mary's  letter  forward  ?  Poor  thing,  I  am 
really  sorry  for  her  and  Ferguson,  particularly  for  him,  he  is  so 
active,  and  will  feel  so  much  being  laid  on  the  shelf.  I  am  sure  I 
have  great  reason  for  thankfulness  for  the  excellent  health  I  have 
hitherto  enjoyed,  and,  as  dear  Charlotte  says,  '  for  the  thousands  of 
blessings  I  possess.'  May  God  crown  all  his  blessings  by  restoring 
us  all  to  each  other  in  health  and  happiness. 

"  Be  sure  and  tell  me  all  about  what  you  give  the  dear  little  chicks 
at  Christmas,  and  how  Harrie  and  Willie  and  '  Bebee  '  behave  them- 
selves. John  Walter,  Charlotte,  and  Bessie  I  look  upon  as  gentle- 
man and  ladies,  who  no  doubt  will  consider  themselves  '  in  a  con- 
catenation accordingly.'  May  God  bless  and  watch  over  you  all, 
and  over  me.  You  will  have  found  this  letter  mighty  stupid,  but  I 
really  had  nothing  to  say,  and  so  I  sat  down  and  chattered  about 
whatever  came  uppermost.  Talking  of  crossing  letters,  I  wish  you 
would  take  two  sheets  when  you  have  more  to  say  than  will  fill  one. 
A  sheet  and  a  half  only  costs  a  single  postage,  and  it  is  much 
pleasanter  to  read  uncrossed  letters. 

"  The  captain  of  our  steamer  is  a  cousin  of  Hamilton  Allen's  wife. 
He  (Allen)  is  one  of  our  clerks  at  New  Orleans,  and  the  captain 
knows  all  about  A.  &  J.  Dennistoun  &  Co.;  so  I  suppose  he  will 
treat  us  well,  which  news,  I  think,  will  relieve  your  mind.  God 
forever  bless  you,  my  own  beloved  wife. 

"Ever  your  attached 

"  Wm.  W." 

New  York,  Friday,  December  19,  1845. 
"  My  Beloved  Husband  : 

"Your  long-waited-for  letter  of  Friday,  12th  inst.,  reached  me 
only  last  night.  I  had  just  been  heaving  a  deep  sigh  as  John  Yuille 
entered,  having  thought  all  hope  for  one  that  day  was  gone.  When 
he  entered,  instead  of  saying  :  '  How  d'ye  do  ? '  I  jumped  up  and 
exclaimed  :  '  Oh  !  God  bless  you,  where's  my  letter  ? ' 

"  Oh,  my  darling,  how  much    I  have  to  thank  God  for,  who  has 


126  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

not  only  brought  you  safely  another  stage  on  your  journey,  but 
given  you  kind  friends  and  refreshment  of  mind  and  body  along 
the  road,  and  prospered  thus  far  the  object  of  your  journey.  I  am 
glad  that  your  '  blunther,'  as  Dr.  Blackburn  says,  was  the  means  of 
your  escaping  so  troublesome  a  charge  as  the  gold  would  have  been. 
I  am  thankful,  too,  that  you  have  the  prospect  of  hearing  a  good 
minister  on  Sunday.  My  Sunday  was  a  very  delightful  day  to  me. 
But  I  must  go  back  a  little  and  retrace  my  adventures,  such  as  they 
are,  from  the  time  I  wrote  to  you  last  week — Sunday,  December  7. 
"  Monday,  Tuesday,  Wednesday,  and  Thursday  passed  away 
quietly  and  pleasantly  with  calls  from  C.  Neilson,  Maria,  Emily 
Foster  and  Eliza  Kane,  Julia  Mills,  C.  Beekman  and  Jane  Hone. 
On  Friday  we  dined  with  Maria  De  Peyster,  and  in  the  evening  I 
went  to  church,  preparatory  to  taking  the  Lord's  Supper  on  Sunday. 
For  account  of  the  evening  church  I  refer  you  to  J.  Walter's  letter, 
only  mentioning  that  Bessie  went  with  me,  and  was  greatly  impressed. 
Mr.  De  Peyster  and  Mr.  Foster  took  me  there,  and  John  Walter  came 
with  me  to  take  me  home.  On  our  return  he  fell  fiat  down  on  the 
pavement  in  the  street,  and  carried  Bessie  over  with  him,  and  /  kept 
my  feet. 

"  Mr.  De  Peyster  calls  here  at  the  hotel  almost  every  night  to  see 
me,  and  is  very  kind  and  attentive,  and  on  one  of  these  calls  two  days 
ago,  as  he  was  entering  the  house,  which  was  quite  dark,  he  stumbled 
against  something  bulky  and  fell  sprawling  his  full  length,  bringing 
that  something  over,  too,  which  proved  to  be  a  buxom  young  woman 
with  her  tub,  scrubbing.  But  to  go  back  to  Sunday  last,  the  4th. 
On  that  day  there  was  a  heavy  pour  of  rain  on  the  top  of  deep 
snow  which  had  fallen  the  previous  night,  and  it  was  bitterly  cold. 
I  had  just  told  John  Walter  to  go  to  the  bar  and  order  them  to  get 
a  coach  for  me,  as  I  wanted  so  much  to  go  to  church,  when  in  came 
a  very  neat  note  from  Miss  Caroline  Howland,  saying,  if  I  were  not 
afraid  to  venture  out,  they  would  call  for  me  in  their  carriage,  and 
they  hoped  I  would  sit  in  their  pew,  as  I  then  would  not  have  to 
change  my  seat.  I  went  with  J.  W.  only,  and  Mr.  Howland  got  out 
and  came  to  the  room  door  for  me,  helping  me  in  as  carefully  as  if  I 
had  been  a  child,  almost  carrying  me,  as  it  was  very  slippery. 

"  The  sermon   was   excellent  and  the  address  very  affecting  and 
solemn.     I  had  prayed  that  I  might  be  able  to  control  my  feelings 


JOURNEY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS   CONCLUDED.  12/ 

at  the  address,  for  when  my  heart  is  tender,  as  at  present,  there  is 
nothing  affects  me  more  than  a  solemn  appeal  at  the  communion 
season,  and  I  was  afraid  I  would  weep  the  whole  time.  However,  I 
shed  no  tears,  though  I  felt  every  word  ;  but  on  coming  out,  when 
we  were  in  the  carriage,  Mr.  Rowland  turned  to  me,  and  in  a  falter- 
ing voice  said  :  '  Mrs.  Wood,  was  not  that  address  excellent  ? — and  so 
feelingly  delivered.'  I  then  saw  the  tears  brimming  in  his  eyes, 
and  he  turned  from  me  quickly  to  conceal  his  emotion.  This  nearly 
upset  me,  but  I  controlled  myself  till  I  got  within  the  house,  and 
then  gave  praise  to  God  for  his  power  over  the  strong  man  '  who  was 
bowed  down,'  and  for  his  mercy  to  another  poor  sinner,  for  if  ever 
there  was  'a  brand  snatched  from  the  burning  'besides myself,  it  was 
poor,  light-hearted,  thoughtless,  gay  S.  H. 

"  On  Monday  J.  Walter  went  to  school  as  usual,  and  hung  up  his 
coat  and  new  cap  in  the  lobby  upstairs  between  many  others,  but 
when  he  went  to  put  them  on  at  3  p.  m.  they  were  gone, — coat,  cap, 
and  lilac  gloves, — and  they  have  not  been  heard  of  since.  This  has 
been  a  sore  grief  to  me,  when  I  was  trying  to  be  economical,  and 
money  goes  so  fast  !  I  immediately  consulted  Mr.  De  Peyster  about 
speaking  to  the  police.  One  man  whom  Mr.  De  P.  had  personally 
obliged  undertook  to  visit  all  the  pawnbrokers  for  him,  but  as  yet  we 
have  heard  nothing  of  them.  Mr.  De  P.  has  lent  J.  W.  one  of  his 
greatcoats  in  the  meantime.  It  is  rather  too  large  for  him,  but  he 
can  wear  it.  To-morrow  he  goes  to  get  a  new  cap.  His  own  best 
one  was  rather  too  small  for  him,  which  he  said  was  his  reason  for 
wearing  it  every  day.  I  at  first  thought  of  keeping  him  from  going 
to  Philadelphia,  if  his  coat  could  not  be  found,  on  account  of  the 
expense,  for  another  one  he  must  have,  his  summer  overcoat  being 
so  thin  and  too  small  for  him,  and  the  weather  is  piercing  cold  ; 
but  I  consulted  Maria,  who  thinks  I  had  better  wait  till  Monday 
and  if  his  coat  be  not  found,  then  order  another  for  him,  which 
the  tailor  says  he  can  make  in  two  days,  and  let  him  go  to  Phila- 
delphia. He  is  not  very  anxious  to  go  himself,  but  would  rather 
like  it  than  remaining  at  home.     No  other  coat  was  stolen  but  his. 

"  On  Wednesday  dear  Bess  went  to  Parmley's,*  had  her  tooth  out, 
and  behaved  like  a  little  woman.     She  had  been  much  troubled  with 

*  A  dentist,  formerly  an  admirer  of  Mrs.  William  Wood,  when  Harriet  Kane. 


128  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

toothache,  night  after  night  kept  awake  by  it,  and  on  examining  her 
mouth  I  found  that  the  old  tooth  was  broken  quite  down  to  the 
gum  and  the  new  one  growing  out  at  the  side.  I  called  first  on 
Parmley  with  Margaret  Hone.  He  took  no  notice  of  her  and  of  a 
roomful  of  ladies  waiting  for  him,  but  rushed  up  to  me,  declaring 
how  glad  he  was  to  see  me,  and  asking  after  you.  He  had  meant 
to  call  on  New  Year's  Day,  when,  he  said,  everybody  was  privileged 
to  call,  and  if  agreeable,  then  name  a  day  to  visit  you  in  the  evening  ; 
that  he  had  been  storing  up  an  immense  amount  of  evidence,  etc., 
and  was  so  sorry  you  had  left  for  New  Orleans.  He  then  said  he 
would  see  Bessie  any  time.  On  coming  home  I  found  her  returned 
from  school  and  crying  with  pain,  but,  being  very  tired,  Jane  Hone 
would  not  allow  me  to  return  with  her,  but  said  she  would  take  her 
there  for  me.  Dear  Bessie  said  she  prayed  for  fortitude  before  she 
went  and  while  she  was  there,  but  that  the  pain  was  awful.  Parm- 
ley had  to  pull  three  of  the  pieces  out  separately.  I  gave  her  a 
shilling  for  her  courage. 

"  On  Thursday  J.  Walter  went  to  Charruaud's  grand  ball  ;  he  went 
at  seven  and  came  away  at  ten,  and  looked  right  down  handsome. 
He  wore  your  white  satin  waistcoat,  had  his  hair  nicely  arranged, 
one  of  my  cambric  handkerchiefs  and  some  scent  upon  it,  and  a 
nice  pair  of  white  kid  gloves.  He  has  behaved  very  well  ever  since 
you  left,  and  I  must  not  forget  to  tell  you  that  he  was  much 
impressed  with  the  address  to  spectators  on  Sunday.  Dr.  Hutton 
asked  :  '  Why  is  it  you  keep  away  ?  You  will  soon  be  summoned  to  the 
bar  of  God,  and  you  know  not  how  soon,  and  what  answer  would 
you  give  ? '  J.  Walter  said  he  had  often  thought  he  ought  soon  to 
become  a  member  of  the  Church,  and  now  more  than  ever,  for 
really,  he  said,  if  called  to  answer  why  he  was  not  one,  he  would 
not  know  what  to  say.  In  understanding  he  ought  certainly  to 
come,  and  in  belief,  he  thought,  too  ;  and  if  he  only  stayed  away 
because  he  was  worldly,  would  staying  away  make  him  less  worldly  ? 
Would  not  joining  the  Church  rather  prove,  under  God,  a  preserva- 
tive from  temptation  and  going  into  the  world  ?  I  knew  not  what 
answer  to  give  to  all  this,  but  thank  God  such  thoughts  were  in  his 
heart. 

"  The  cold  weather  agrees  with  us  all  capitally  and  we  are  all 
quite  well. 


JOURNEY  TO  NEW  ORLEANS  CONCLUDED.       1 29 

"  The  agreement  for  the  room  is  twt  in  the  pocket  of  the  port- 
manteau, but  I  had  already  entered  the  bills  in  the  back  and  front  of 
the  account  book.  Did  I  tell  you  that  we  now  have  sperm  candles 
for  the  bedrooms  instead  of  those  abominable  lamps? 

"  Anna  Winthrop's  children  are  very  ill  of  measles.  Robert  has 
been  dangerously  ill,  but  to-day  is  better. 

"  Mr,  De  Peyster  told  me  to  tell  you  that  to-day  there  is  a  letter 
received  from  Mr.  Webster,  written  to  Astor  or  Professor  Cogswell, 
saying  that  at  present  he  had  not  the  least  apprehension  of  war. 

**  Mr.  De  Peyster,  Maria,  Emily,  John  Hone,  Charles  Winthrop, 
and  Julia  Mills  all  begged  me  to  send  their  love  to  you. 

"Saturday,  December  20,  1845.  A  bitterly  cold  day,  and  it  looks 
like  snow.  I  am  going  up  to  see  Maria  with  my  work  this  morning. 
If  the  Winthrops  are  not  perfectly  well  and  out  by  Tuesday,  I 
shall  not  venture  there  on  Christmas.  God  bless  you,  my  darling.  I 
am  sending  this  letter  to  the  ofifice  for  Dawson  to  send  off  by  the 
first  opportunity.  I  shall  write  next  week  to  Mary  Ferguson  and 
Eleanor  Dennistoun.  God  bless  you.  No  mail  in  yet  on  account 
of  the  snow.     The  steamer  is  in  from  Liverpool. 

"  Willie  said  to  me  yesterday  :  '  Oh  !  mamma,  do  read  me  dear 
papa's  letter.'  I  read  that  part  to  him  about  the  children  and 
about  '  dear  little  Willie,'  '  Oh  ! '  said  he,  '  what  a  nice  letter  ;  you 
ought  to  keep  that  letter.' 

"  Ever  your  own 

"  H.  W." 

"  No.  230,  Mansion  House,  Appalachicola,  Fla., 

"Sunday,  December  21,  1845. 
"  My  Own  Sweet  Wife  : 

"This  place  is  the  very  fag  end  of  creation  ;  two  steps  further 
and  you  fall  over  the  edge.  You  remember  the  southwest  pass  of 
the  Mississippi  ?  Imagine  the  misbegotten  land  at  the  entrance  of 
it  covered  with  pure  white  sand,  on  that  sand  a  few  pines  and 
palmettos,  and  perhaps  forty  or  fifty  warehouses  and  wooden  houses, 
and  then  you  have  a  pretty  fair  idea  of  the  city  of  Appalachicola. 

"  I  wrote  to  you  last  from  Columbus  ;  next  morning  I  was  up 
before  daylight,  lit  my  candle,  and  was  dressed  and  ready,  my  Bible 
read,  etc.,  etc.,  by  7.30,  but  Sellar,  trusting  to  a  cat-witted  nigger  to 


130  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

awake  him,  did  not  get  up  till  7.30,  by  which  time  the  dray  to  take 
our  '  plunder  '  to  the  steamer  was  at  the  door.  He  had  to  hurry- 
scurry  to  get  dressed,  and  meantime  I  sent  down  my  baggage. 
When  I  went  to  the  door,  I  found  my  portmaneau  had  gone  nobody 
seemed  to  know  whither,  but  some  said  to  the  boat,  and  no  dray  was 
there.  In  a  little  while  another  dray  was  got ;  this  is  simply  four 
wheels  on  which  are  placed  three  planks  ;  then  two  horses  are 
harnessed,  and  a  negro  drives  them.  Sellar  and  I  mounted  on  the 
top  of  our  baggage,  fearing  to  be  too  late  for  the  steamer,  and  a  fine 
jolt  we  had  of  it  for  a  mile  or  so.  However,  neither  we  nor  our 
baggage  fell  off.  As  soon  as  I  got  to  the  steamer  I  asked  for  my 
portmanteau  ;  it  had  not  come,  and  I  was  in  a  fine  '  fix,'  when,  looking 
about,  I  s-^w  it  on  a  dray  with  another  man's  baggage,  and  joyfully 
welcomed  my  stray  sheep.  We  immediately  started  off  in  the 
Augusta,  in  which  Sellar  and  I  had  the  two  best  staterooms. 

"  Chattahoochee  is  very  pretty,  and  the  river  winds  about  a  great 
deal,  but,  on  the  whole,  like  all  American  rivers  I  have  seen  except 
the  Hudson,  it  becomes  monotonous.  We  passed  Eufala,  a  small 
but  prettily  situated  town  in  Alabama,  about  sixty  miles  below 
Columbus.  The  river  here  is  spanned  by  a  very  high  wooden 
bridge,  under  which  the  steamers  go  without  lowering  their  funnels. 
We  lay-to  at  Fort  Gaines  Friday  night,  and  it  was  so  cold  that  the 
water  in  the  tin  basin  which  I  had  'boned'  from  the  general 
trough  and  put  under  my  bed  or  berth  froze  as  thick  as  a  dollar 
and  the  water  on  deck  froze  an  inch  thick.  I  was  positively 
afraid  that  my  nose  would  be  frozen  off ;  it  chilled  my  fingers  to 
touch  it.  Yesterday  (Saturday)  we  kept  steaming  on,  stopping 
occasionally  to  take  in  cotton  and  to  '  wood  up.'  Then  Sellar  and 
I  would  land  and  take  a  stroll  in  the  woods  or  into  a  cotton  field, 
and  pick  some  of  the  seed  vessels  or  pods  with  the  cotton  in  them. 
During  the  day  we  passed  the  mouth  of  the  Flint  River.  After  the 
junction  of  the  two  rivers  (Chattahoochee  and  Flint)  the  united 
stream  takes  the  name  of  the  Appalachicola,  and  just  about  here  we 
got  into  Florida.  Last  night  we  lay-to  at  the  head  of  the  narrows. 
Here  the  river  runs  very  swiftly,  yet  pursues  such  a  tortuous  course 
that  a  steamer  can  scarcely  turn  about.  We  struck  a  tree  and 
carried  away  some  of  our  paddles  this  morning  coming  through  the 
narrows.     After  passing  these  the  river  gets  wide,  and  the    shores 


JOURNEY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS   CONCLUDED.  131 

low  like  those  of  the  Mississippi  near  the  Balize,  with  cypress 
swamps  and  then  pine  barrens,  and  I  saw  several  palmetto  trees 
which  looked  exactly  like  palms.  The  palmetto  or  Spanish  dagger 
J.  Walter  will  remember  at  New  Orleans,  growing  like  a  weed  ;  well, 
here  it  grows  into  a  tree,  and  the  stem  is  reticulated  in  a  most 
curious  way,  exactly  like  trelliswork  ;  the  old  leaves  fall  off,  and  the 
lower  part  of  the  stem  splits  as  the  trunk  expands,  but  the  upper 
part  of  the  stem  continues  attached.  The  trelliswork  is  so  beauti- 
fully regular  that  Sellar  could  hardly  believe  it  was  not  artificial. 
We  passed  to-day  the  remains  of  Fort  Gadsden,  which,  being  held 
by  Spaniards  and  runaway  negroes,  Andrew  Jackson  blew  up  in  the 
Florida  war. 

"  We  arrived  at  Appalachicola  about  noon.  This  is  a  wooden 
hotel  of  two  stories,  but  large  and  commodious,  nice  and  clean. 
Sellar,  in  whose  room  I  am  now  sitting,  has  a  large  square  room  with 
four  windows,  a  carpet,  a  fine  wood  fire,  and  nice  dimity  curtains. 
My  room  is  very  small,  and  has  no  fire  or  fireplace.  Sellar  wished 
to  give  me  this  room,  but  I  insisted  on  tossing  up,  and  lost  my  toss. 
My  room  is  very  small,  with  Indian  matting  on  the  floor,  but  it  is 
neat  and  clean.  After  dinner  took  a  walk  along  the  seashore,  for 
this  place  stands  on  the  right  bank  of  the  Appalachicola  just  as  it 
enters  Appalachicola  Bay.  There  seem  to  be  very  decent,  respectable 
people  staying  in  the  inn.  We  have  just  returned  from  evening 
church,  Presbyterian,  '  in  an  upper  room  furnished.'  Congregation 
chiefly  young  men,  several  of  whom  made  the  choir,  one  playing  the 
fiddle.  First  hymn,  '  There  is  a  fountain  filled  with  blood,'  etc.;  the 
last,  *  Lord,  dismiss  us  with  thy  blessing,'  etc.  Text  of  the  sermon, 
*  What  shall  a  man  give  in  exchange  for  his  soul  "^ '  etc.  In  the  ser- 
mon the  preacher  said  that  a  man's  soul  was  worth  '  not  one  cent  less 
than  God's  heart's  blood.'  From  this  brick  you  may  judge  of  the 
building.  I  was  glad  and  rejoiced  to  know  that  here  at  the  end  of 
the  earth  there  were  some  eighty  or  one  hundred  people  who  could 
meet  and  sing  *  There  is  a  fountain  filled  with  blood.'  At  the 
last  prayer  I  was  going  to  sit  still  and  lean  my  head  down,  but  got  a 
nudge  from  Sellar,  so  rose  up  ;  he  told  me  he  had  fallen  asleep  early 
in  the  sermon  and  was  awoke  by  the  people  rising  up,  and,  seeing  me, 
thought  I  was  in  the  same  condemnation  as  himself,  which  was  '  pot 
calling  kettle  black,'  etc. 


132  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  We  were  much  interested  in  the  steward  of  our  boat,  a  fine  honest 
creature,  a  colored  man  and  a  slave  ;  his  owner  hires  him  out,  as  he 
says,  '  to  himself.'  That  is,  Sam  pays  his  owner  $150  per  annum, 
and  what  he  makes  more  he  keeps  to  himself.  He  wants  to  buy  his 
freedom,  for  which  his  owner  asks  ^850,  but  he  says  he  is  now  nearly 
forty,  and  he  fears  he  may  not  be  able  to  get  it.  He  says  the  colored 
people  speak  and  think  of  nothing  else  but  their  freedom  ;  but  I 
have  full  details  of  his  most  interesting  and  simple-hearted  conver- 
sation in  my  notebook,  which  began  by  his  asking  me  if  the  country 
I  came  from  was  a  State.  He  said  :  '  Well,  master,  we  be  all  equal 
in  heaven.'  He  has  a  wife,  but  no  children.  Sellar  and  I  gave  him 
^2.50  each  toward  his  freedom.  His  wife's  master  asks  $650  for 
her.  He  says  nearly  all  the  slaves  in  Georgia  are  permitted  to  go  to 
church  on  Sunday,  and  have  it  as  a  holiday.  If  many  of  the  slaves 
be  as  intelligent  as  this  man,  I  can  see  that  if  Great  Britain  landed 
black  troops  on  the  southern  Atlantic  coast  and  proclaimed 
'  liberty  to  the  captive,'  all  the  negroes  would  rise  in  insurrection, 
which  I  don't  think  they  would  do  in  Louisiana  and  Mississippi. 

"  The  propeller  we  expected  here  is  not  arrived,  and  it  is  quite 
uncertain  when  she  may  come.  A  sailing  schooner  is  expected 
daily,  but  if  she  doesn't  arrive  to-morrow,  I  think  we  shall  return  to 
Columbus  and  proceed  from  there  to  Mobile  and  New  Orleans. 

"  Good-night,  my  dearest.  God  forever  bless  you  and  my  beloved 
children.  It  is  again  freezing  hard  and  killing  the  orange  trees.  It 
must  be  fearfully  cold  weather  with  you. 

"  Monday,  December,  22,  1845.  I  find  that  there  will  be  no 
opportunity  from  this  for  New  Orleans  for  a  week,  so  we  have 
decided  to  return  up  the  river  to  Columbus  to-night  by  either  the 
Champio7i  or  the  Emily.  Mr.  Burgoyne  from  New  York,  who  has 
already  waited  here  a  week,  will  accompany  us.  We  hope  to  reach 
Columbus  on  Wednesday,  and  proceed  from  there  to  Montgomery, 
and  so  on  to  Mobile.  I  do  not  know  whether  I  shall  have  time  to 
write  to  you  from  Columbus  or  not.  My  next  will  probably  be  from 
New  Orleans,  which  may  not  reach  you  for  a  fortnight  after  this  or 
more. 

"Although  this  place  is  on  the  verge  of  creation,  yet  there  are 
plenty  of  oysters,  fish,  venison,  wild  turkeys,  canvasback  ducks, 
so  that  Emily  and  Foster,  with  the  aid  of  old  Bridget  to   cook  for 


JOURNEY  TO  NEW  ORLEANS  CONCLUDED.       1 33 

them,  would  get  on  pretty  well  here  together  for  a  year  or  so.     The 
frost  has  gone  and  the  weather  is  delightfully  mild. 

"  God  forever  bless  you  and  my  darling  children,  and  unite  us 
again  in  health  of  mind  and  body,  and  keep  all  of  us  from  evil  and 
from  temptation. 

"  Ever  your  own  attached 

"Wm.  W." 

"  Steamer  Emily,  Chattahoochee  River, 

"  Tuesday,  December  23,  1845. 
"  My  Sweet  Wife  : 

"  I  wrote  to  you  yesterday  from  Appalachicola,  but  I  should  not 
wonder  if  this  reached  you  first,  as  I  intend  to  put  it  into  the  mail  at 
Columbus,  where  I  hope  to  arrive  to-morrow  morning  in  time  to 
start  by  the  stagecoach  for  Montgomery.  We  found,  as  I  told  you 
yesterday,  that  there  was  no  chance  of  our  getting  away  from  Appa- 
lachicola direct  for  New  Orleans  within  five  days,  and  then  only  by  a 
sailing  schooner,  which  might  take  from  thirty-six  hours  to  two  weeks 
to  get  there.  So  we  decided  to  return  up  the  river  to  Columbus  again, 
which,  by  the  way,  has  been  half  burned  down  since  we  left  it,  a  fire 
having  broken  out  in  the  evening  of  the  day  we  left,  and  consumed 
sixty  houses.  There  were  two  steamers  lying  at  Appalachicola,  the 
Champion  and  the  Emily,  both  fast  boats,  but  the  latter  the  newer,  so, 
after  much  hesitation,  we  decided  on  the  latter.  It  eventually  started 
first.  We  left  yesterday  at  5  p.  M.,  I  having  first  laid  in  three  pine- 
apples and  one  dozen  oranges,  and  Tom  Sellar  four  pints  of  porter. 
A  Mr.  Burgoyne  of  New  York  is  the  only  passenger  besides  our- 
selves. The  staterooms  are  large  and  commodious,  and  we  are  as 
comfortable  as  it  is  possible  to  be.  The  captain  is  a  fine  hearty  old 
gentleman  of  the  name  of  Roland,  and  the  clerk  is  a  reduced 
gentleman  ;  all  the  waiters  and  chambermaids  are  white. 

"  We  saw  numerous  palmetto  trees  for  twenty  or  thirty  miles  after 
we  left  Appalachicola  ;  they  are  of  two  sorts  :  one,  called  cabbage 
palmetto,  bears  a  sort  of  cabbage,  and  is  taller  and  slenderer  than  the 
saw  palmetto,  of  which  I  attempted  to  send  you  a  drawing  in  my  last. 
I  was  told  at  Columbus  of  a  Frenchman  who  had  landed  from 
Europe  at  Appalachicola, and  after  looking  around  exclaimed:  '  Well, 
if  dis  is  America,  I  am  disgoost,'  and  I  don't  wonder  at  it. 


134  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF     WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  We  saw  this  morning  on  the  bank  of  the  river  a  flock  of  not 
less  than  twenty  wild  turkeys.  We  stopped  to  wood,  and  Sellar, 
Burgoyne,  and  I  have  been  about  a  mile  into  the  woods,  and  got  a 
bottle  of  fine  milk  for  tea.  We  had  an  excellent  baked  redfish  for 
dinner  to-day ;  but  the  boat  is  going  along  with  such  a  head  of  steam, 
and  shakes  so  much,  that  I  can't  write. 

"  Wednesday,  December  24,  1845.  Still  on  board  the  Emily,  and 
instead  of  reaching  Columbus  this  morning  in  time  to  start  by  the 
stage,  which  leaves  at  9  a.  m.,  it  is  a  great  chance  if  we  get  there  to- 
night, owing  to  the  low  state  of  the  river.  We  are  now  about  fifty- 
five  miles  below  Columbus. 

"I  was  reading  yesterday  'Macaulay's  Essays  '  on  '  the  lives  of 
Warren  Hastings  and  Frederick  the  Great,  and  I  am  now  at  his 
Roman  ballads.  Last  night  I  sewed  some  buttons  on  my  clothes. 
When  I  took  out  the  '  housewife,'  '  I  kissed  the  B  in  Benjamin,'  for 
its  dear  maker's  sake.  Blessings  rich  and  manifold,  spiritual  and 
temporal,  be  on  your  head,  my  darling  wife.  You  are  inexpressibly 
dear  to  me.  What  would  this  world  be  without  you  ?  And  with 
you  and  my  beloved  children  in  sound  health  of  body  and  mind, 
and  myself  in  the  enjoyment  of  the  same  great  blessings,  we  may 
well  be  contented — '  contented  wi'  little  and  canty  wi'  mair.' 
A  fragment  from  Burns  runs  in  my  head,  '  the  echo  of  an  idle  song, 
which  went  and  came  a  thousand  times,'  and  so  I  give  it  you  : 

"  '  What  though  as  commoners  of  air 

We  wander  forth,  we  know  not  where, 

But*  either  house  or  hall, 
Yet  nature's  charms,  the  fields,  the  woods, 
The  sweeping  vales,  the  foaming  floods, 

Are  free  alike  to  all.' 

"  What  a  comfort  it  is,  dearest  one,  when  we  are  absent  from  each 
other,  to  feel  and  know  that  we  have  the  same  Father  in  heaven, 
with  whom  there  is  no  variableness  nor  shadow  of  turning  ;  that 
not  one  hair  of  our  head  can  fall  to  the  ground  without  his  knowl- 
edge ;  that  though  our  course  here  maybe  dark  and  troublous  {ours 
has  only  been  checkered),  we  can,  through  the  merit  of  our  blessed 
Saviour,  look  forward  to  that  rest  which  remaineth  for  the  people  of 

*  '  But '  is  a  Scottish  word  signifying  wiikout. 


JOURNEY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS   CONCLUDED.  1 35 

God,  where  there  shall  be  no  more  selfishness,  no  more  sorrow  or 
sigliing,  no  more  separations,  and  where  God  shall  wipe  away  the 
tears  from  all  eyes.  God  grant  that  we  and  all  our  dear  children 
may  there  meet  around  the  throne,  clothed  in  the  robes  of  Christ's 
righteousness  ! 

"  We  have  been  wooding,  and  are  now  again  setting  off,  so  I  must 
stop,  and  go  and  eat  an  orange. 

"  Columbus,  Christmas,  1845.  Many  happy  Christmases  to  you, 
and  all  my  dear  children.  We  arrived  here  last  night  about  eight 
o'clock,  and  had  to  walk  in  a  pitch-dark  night  from  the  river  to  the 
hotel,  about  three-quarters  of  a  mile,  and  a  good  part  of  the  way 
over  the  ankles  in  mud.  However,  here  we  are,  safe  and  sound.  It 
is  now  about  8  A.  M.,  and  I  am  writing  this  on  my  bed  for  want  of  a 
table,  and  expect  every  moment  to  be  called  to  breakfast.  We  shall 
not  know  whether  we  can  get  on  to  Montgomery  to-day  until  the 
stage  comes  in  from  Macon.  If  it  has  more  than  four  passengers 
who  are  going  through,  we  shall  require  to  wait  all  day,  which  will 
be  a  bore  ;  but  if  you  don't  get  a  letter  from  me  the  day  after 
you  get  this,  then  you  may  conclude  that  we  have  got  on,  and  my 
next  will  be  from  Mobile  or  New  Orleans,  probably  a  week  or  ten 
days  after  you  get  this. 

"  After  being  so  much  out  of  the  world  as  we  were  at  Appalachi- 
cola  you  can't  imagme  with  what  avidity  we  laid  hold  of  the  New 
York  and  New  Orleans  papers.  My  latest  date  from  you  is  Decem- 
ber 7,  but  there  are  New  York  papers  here  of  December  18.  I 
don't  expect  any  letters  from  you  till  I  reach  New  Orleans.  As  we 
start  soon  after  breakfast,  I  must  send  this  off  now. 

"  God  forever  bless  you  and  my  dear  children.  John  Walter  takes 
his  flight  to  Philadelphia  to-morrow.  May  our  heavenly  Father  watch 
over  him,  and  comfort  you  in  his  absence. 

"  Ever  thine  own  attached  husband, 

"Wm.  W." 

Fort  Gadsden,  referred  to  in  a  foregoing  letter,  was  blown  up  by 
a  bomb  fired  by  General  Jackson  from  a  schooner  in  which  he  was 
sailing  past.  The  bomb  lighted  on  the  magazine  and  blew  the  fort 
to  pieces.  Vessels  taking  in  cargo  at  Appalachicola  lie  off  on  the 
verge  of  the  horizon  and  are  loaded  by  lighters. 


136  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"New  York,  December  26,  1845. 

"  My  Dearest  William  : 

"  I  have  been  feeling  low-spirited  and  cross  for  several  days  past, 
from  a  consciousness  that  I  ought  to  write  to  you,  and  not  know- 
ing where  to  write.  I  longed  so  much  to  pour  out  my  heart  to 
you  !  I  hope  you  got  my  last  long,  closely  written  letter,  sent  to 
Dawson  to  direct  for  me.  I  will  not  cross  my  letters  or  write 
so  illegibly  again,  you  dear  fellow,  but  I  did  it  for  economy's 
sake.  My  last  to  you  acknowledged  receipt  of  yours  of  December 
9-10,  and  to-day  those  of  December  12,  14,  15,  and  16  have  come  to 
hand.  I  shall  proceed  in  a  business  way  to  notice  some. of  the  par- 
ticulars of  each  before  I  forget.  First,  let  me  thank  you  for  your 
unwearied  kindness  and  goodness  in  so  constantly  writing  to  me. 
God  bless  and  reward  you  for  it,  and  may  I  be  a  better  and  more  de- 
serving wife  to  you  when  you  return. 

"In  No.  II  you  write  about  Dr.  Pearce's  sermon.  Maria  re- 
marked I  ought  to  tell  you  how  wrong  you  were  not  to  conform  to 
the  decency  of  custom  in  standing  at  prayer,  though  you  disap- 
proved, and  rising  at  the  blessing  ;  that  the  congregation  who  noticed 
you  would  never  dream  of  your  motive,  and  would  think  you  were 
acting  out  of  a  disrespect  to  the  house  of  God.  Now,  I  fully  agree 
with  her  there,  and  though  you  may  not  join  in  the  prayer  of  a 
preacher  whom  you  disapprove,  you  may  rise  and  pray  to  God  to 
forgive  the  error  of  the  preacher,  to  grant  him  the  teaching  of  his 
Holy  Spirit,  and  to  keep  you  and  those  who  hear  him  from  being  led 
away  by  any  doctrines  contrary  to  the  Word  of  God. 

"  No.  12,  from  Macon,  is  written  in  a  most  lively  strain,  and  made 
me  laugh  heartily  several  times,  though  I  grieved  to  think  you  had 
not  been  well,  and  cheated  me  in  your  last  by  never  mentioning  it. 

"  I  shall  be  sure  to  tell  Foster  and  Mr.  De  Peyster  about  the  man- 
ufacturers in  Georgia  wanting  no  tariff.  I  always  deliver  all  your 
messages  faithfully,  and  give  all  the  interesting  anecdotes  of  your 
letters  to  Mr.  De  Peyster,  who  takes  a  very  great  interest  in  them. 
He  has  been  quite  unwell  with  his  liver  for  some  days,  but  is  now 
better  again. 

"  No.  14  arrived  also  to-day,  and  tells  me  of  Hutchison's  mis- 
take.    It  was  too  bad  in  our  friend  Cross  to  put  off  the  writing  of 


JOURNEY  TO  NEW  ORLEANS  CONCLUDED.       1 37 

the  explanatory  letter  to  Hutchison  upon  you,  as,  of  course,  he  must 
have  known  that  an  explanation  was  to  be  made.  My  last  letter 
told  you  of  the  improvement  in  our  breakfasts  and  dinners.  I 
sent  for  friend  Whitman  to  scold  about  our  fire  being  always  heaped 
halfway  up  the  chimney  in  spite  of  my  remonstrances,  and  sent  also 
for  the  fireman  to  make  his  appearance.  This  was  on  the  23d. 
Little  Comstock  also  came  to  see  the  row.  I  said  :  '  Captain  Com- 
stock,  I  presume?'  for  the  little  fellow  never  spoke,  but  stood  at 
the  door,  hearing  me  scold.  He  then  asked  me  if  we  were  comfort- 
able, etc.,  and  while  they  were  present  down  came  heaps  of  burning 
soot,  the  chimney  having  taken  fire.  Fortunately  a  heavy  fall  of 
snow  helped  to  put  it  out  soon. 

"I  did  not  send  you  Mary's  letter  on  account  of  the  postage  of  so 
many,  but  you  had  all  the  news  in  it.  I  had  another  from  Mary  to 
me  last  steamer,  and  one  from  Eleanor.  There  were  no  letters  for 
you.  Dear  Mary's  was  merely  one  of  condolence  to  me  on  your  ab- 
sence, and  Sc<.ying  her  husband  was  a  great  deal  easier,  and  that  Dr. 
Wood  would  permit  him  in  another  week  to  go  to  Glasgow  for  a  few 
days  to  see  what  was  doing  ;  that  her  children  were  improving  at  their 
classes  ;  that  both  Dr.  Wood's  family  and  your  Uncle  Patrick's  were 
very  kind  and  attentive  ;  Uncle  Patrick  much  better,  and  her  own 
health  a  little  improved,  so  that  she  could  drive  out  daily.  Eleanor 
writes  that  her  mother  is  not  so  well,  and  that  poor  Mrs.  Young  had  a 
very  severe  illness  in  September,  and  mourned  our  absence  much;  she 
has  now  recovered.  Eliza  and  James  were  in  London,  Robert  Den- 
nistoun  in  Liverpool  on  his  way  to  join  them  on  the  Continent ;  her- 
self and  family  well ;  Uncle  Alick  grumbling  about  money  matters, 
but  looking  fat  and  happy  in  spite  of  it  ;  Murray  had  written 
her  that  he  thought  you  would  find  business  matters  in  such  a  train 
at  New  Orleans  that  you  might  return  sooner  than  you  expected  to 
New  York. 

"  John  Walter  goes  to-morrow  to  Philadelphia.  I  have  attended 
to  all  your  advice  for  him,  and  I  trust  he  will  enjoy  himself  and  get 
no  harm,  but  good,  of  his  journey.  He  seems  sober-minded  and 
thoughtful,  having  just  recovered  from  a  pretty  smart  attack  of  fever, 
headache,  and  sickness.  Charlotte  will  tell  you  we  have  been  all 
ailing,  that  is,  all  but  Helen  and  Willie.  Powell  and  Charlotte  her- 
self are  now  the  worst.     None  of  us  could  go  to  Anna's  on  account 


138  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

of  the  measles,  but  they  had  a  grand  jolHfication  there  and  a  very- 
pleasant  one.  J.  AValter  and  I  dined  at  Jane  Hone's  with  Maria  and 
De  Peyster.  Charlotte  was  too  ill  to  go,  and  Bessie  preferred  to  stay 
at  home  with  her.  She  (Charlotte)  was  not  too  ill  to  enjoy  herself 
at  home,  but,  her  throat  being  sore,  and  it  being  a  very  wet  day,  she 
did  not  go  out.  I  returned  at  seven  with  poor  J.  Walter  feeling 
wretched.  A  good  dose  of  medicine  and  a  hot  drink  have  revived 
him,  and  he  feels  able  to  go  to-morrow. 

*'  I  inclose  a  letter  sent  by  Dawson  to-night  with  a  parcel  of 
papers,  etc.  Shall  I  send  the  latter  on  to  you  ?  I  have  read  Tot's  let- 
ter, which  I  think  gives  you  enough  of  the  Christmas,  and  my  paper  is 
out.  I  sent  a  pretty  card  basket  (three  dollars)  to  C  Neilson,  a  work- 
box  (six  shillings)  to  E.  Mills,  a  gold  pencil  case  like  the  one  you  gave 
me  to  Margaret  Lawrence,  and  the  paper  case  to  Harriet  Mills.  J.  W. 
takes  on  a  velvet  bag  embroidered  with  gold  like  Margaret  Hone's 
to  Bessie  Kane.  Margaret  Hone  sent  our  Bessie  a  book  and  Willie 
a  box  of  handsome  marbles.  Jane  Hone  sent  him  some  little  books. 
Emily  Foster  gave  Bessie  the  '  Lights  and  Shadows  of  Scottish  Life,' 
and  Maria  gave  Bessie  a  morocco  case  with  silver  working  imple- 
ments. Emily  Foster  gave  Mr.  De  Peyster  a  pair  of  gold  spectacles, 
and  Maria  a  camel's-hair  scarf  for  her  neck.  Mr.  De  Peyster  gave 
her  a  silver  slop  basin,  and  Mr.  Foster  gave  her  a  magnificent  silver 
tea  urn.  God  bless  you„  my  very  dear  William.  I  have  left  no 
room  to  tell  you  all  I  feel  to  you. 

"  Johnny  has  his  new  greatcoat,  which  is  quilted  in  the  front  with 
silk,  and  has  better  velvet  upon  it  than  the  other,  and  deeper  cuffs, 
to  allow  for  his  growing.  I  made  a  bargain  with  Jennings  to  make 
it  for  fifteen  dollars.  His  new  cap  was  two  dollars,  very  nice,  and  I 
gave  him  new  dark  gloves,  and  also  a  new  pair  of  white  kid,  and  lent 
him  two  of  my  white  handkerchiefs.  He  is  to  return  on  Wednesday 
night.  I  have  an  invitation  to  Mrs.  James  De  Peyster's  on  Monday 
next.  Mr.  Spencer  was  here  last  Saturday.  He  returned  on  Friday. 
They  are  at  the  Astor  House. 

"  December  27,  1845.     Dear  Johnny  is  off  ;  much  better — indeed, 
quite  well.     A  fine,  frosty  day  ;  crisp  snow  underneath  your  feet.     I 
am  just  going  with  all  five  children  to  take  a  v;alk,  '  Bebee  '  and  all. 
Powell's  cold  is  so  bad  I  am  afraid  to  let  her  go.     God  bless  you. 
"Ever  thine  "  H." 


JOURNEY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS   CONCLUDED,  1 39 

"  Steamer  Marengo,  Alabama  River, 

"  December  27,  1845. 
**  My  Own  Sweet  Wife  : 

"  I  wrote  you  a  few  lines  of  postscript  on  Christmas  morning,  and 
sent  off  my  letter  at  Columbus,  which  place  we  left  that  day  about 
9  A.  M.  Sellar  rode  beside  the  driver,  and  as  there  were  only  seven 
inside,  including  a  negro,  we  were  pretty  comfortable.  The  road 
was  very  bad — a  good  deal  of  corduroy,  deep  red  clay,  creeks  to 
cross,  coming  up  to  the  bottom  of  the  carriage,  and  the  rest  of  the 
way  over  pine  barrens.  We  took  ten  hours  to  do  the  forty-seven 
miles  to  Chehaw,  where  we  stopped  for  the  night.  We  dined  about 
halfway  between  Columbus  and  Chehaw  ;  the  house  we  stopped  at 
was  of  frame,  and  there  was  a  tolerably  decent  parlor,  with  a  rous- 
ing fire  of  pine  logs,  but  the  dinner  was  laid  in  an  outhouse,  built 
of  logs  and  only  lighted  by  a  hole  in  the  wall.  As  the  day  was 
bitter  cold,  and  the  wind  blew  keenly  through  said  hole,  we  had  at 
least  plenty  of  fresh  air  with  our  Christmas  dinner.  The  table- 
cloth was  dirty,  and  the  knives  and  forks  ditto.  No  bread,  but  hoe- 
cakes  of  Indian  corn,  broiled  quails,  and  a  villainously  bad  chicken 
pie.  I  ate  the  hoe-cake  and  quails  (broiled),  and  washed  all  down 
with  tumblers  of  delicious  milk,  and,  in  fact,  made  a  capital  dinner. 

"  '  Monarchs,  we  envy  not  your  fate  ; 
We  look  with  pity  on  the  great.' 

"  There  were  some  very  pleasant  fellows  in  the  coach — among 
them  a  Mr.  Wall,  a  member  of  the  Senate  of  Florida,  and  a  Mr. 
Macmachie,  an  old  Scotsman,  \vho  left  'mine  own,  my  native  land  ' 
in  1818,  and  has  not  been  there  since.  They  had  some  wine  with 
them,  and  uncorked  two  bottles  of  prime  champagne,  of  which  I 
took  two  tumblers,  or  thereabouts,  and  we  were  all  as  merry  as 
crickets. 

"  After  this  we  had  still  twenty  miles  to  make  of  horrid  road  to 
Montgomery,  which  we  reached  at  7  p.  m.  By  the  way,  we  passed 
on  the  road  a  grave,  with  a  wooden  fence  round  it,  where  rest  the 
remains  of  two  passengers  killed  by  the  Creek  Indians  in  1836,  only 
nine  years  ago  !  The  Creeks  attacked  the  coach,  burned  it,  killed 
the  horses,  and  shot  these  two  passengers,  the  driver  and  the  rest 
escaping  into  the  woods  and  swamps.     At  Chehaw  we  found  really 


I40  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

('  for  them  diggin's  ')  a  very  comfortable  inn,  with  a  nice  parlor  and 
rousing  fire  of  pine.  Four  of  the  passengers  were  put  into  a  room 
with  four  beds,  and  Sellar  and  I  in  one  with  two,  and  famous  fires 
in  all.  The  night  was  piercing  cold,  and  the  wind  blowing  a  small 
gale  through  the  window  at  the  head  of  my  bed.  However,  first  let 
me  tell  you  we  had  a  capital  supper  of  partridge,  ham,  etc.,  etc., 
tea,  coffee,  and  milk.  I  gave  out  a  great  lot  of  tny  tea,  but  it  was 
drawn  too  long  and  as  black  as  coffee  and  as  bitter  as  gall.  Alas, 
alas,  for  the  treat  *we  had  been  all  expecting  !  After  this,  when  we 
returned  to  the  parlor,  I  volunteered  to  make  a  big  bowl  of  eggnog 
for  the  company,  so  I  sent  out  and  got  eight  eggs,  one  for  each,  and 
with  these,  sugar,  nutmeg,  and  a  bottle  and  a  half  of  good  madeira, 
I  made  a  great  bresv,  and  we  kept  Christmas  night  at  Chehaw  to  the 
best  of  our  abilities. 

"  '  The  nicht  drave  on  wi'  sangs  and  clatter, 
And  aye  the  ale  was  growin'  better,' 

as  Burns  says  in  *  Tarn  o'  Shanter.'  We  had  no  songs,  although 
Sellar  bribed  one  of  the  negroes  by  the  offer  of  half  a  dollar  to  sing 
a  negro  melody,  but  it  was  a  failure.  So  we  gave  him  a  tumbler  of 
eggnog,  which  made  him  grin  with  delight  from  ear  to  ear.  Upon 
the  whole  we  really  had  some  fun,  more  than  anyone  could  reason- 
ably have  anticipated  in  the  center  of  the  woods  of  Alabama,  in  a 
frame  house  and  the  frost  bitter.     And  so  I  spent  my  Christmas  ! 

"  We  had  good,  clean,  comfortable  beds,  but  I  had  taken  such 
strong  tea  that  I  hardly  closed  an  eye  all  night.  I  lay  watching  the 
embers  and  wondering  if  I  should  catch  cold  from  the  wind  blowing 
in  at  the  back  of  my  head  (which,  I  am  happy  to  say,  I  have  not), 
and  planning  business  matters.  It  seemed  to  me  that,  to  carry  on 
our  business,  I  ought  to  reside  in  New  York,  visit  England  every 
year,  and  make  a  tour  like  the  present  every  winter  to  New  Orleans, 
the  only  objection  to  which  neat  little  scheme  would  be  the  necessity 
of  leaving  you  and  my  darling  children  for  five  months  or  so  out  of 
every  twelve.  Then  I  thought  whether  it  was  not  my  duty  to  sub- 
mit to  this  sacrifice  in  order  to  have  you  and  them  comfortably 
settled  in  New  York — you  with  your  sisters  and  they  at  good  schools  ; 
and  I  arose  in  much  doubt  on  the  subject.  And  so  I  spent  the  night 
of  Christmas,  1845,  having  frequently  during  the  day  thought  of  you 


JOURNEY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS   CONCLUDED.  141 

and  the  children  and  their  Christmas  gifts,  and  fearing  that  you 
would  not  enjoy  the  day  from  thinking  of  parting  with  John  Walter 
to-morrow. 

"  Yesterday  we  left  Chehaw  about  10.30  a.  m.,  went  by  railway 
forty  miles  to  Montgomery,  where  we  got  into  this  steamer  about 
4  p.  M.,  and  are  now  about  160  miles  down  the  Alabama.  We  have 
still  about  220  miles  to  go  to  Mobile. 

"  Last  night  I  slept  well,  but  woke  this  morning  dreaming  I  had  just 
seen  you.  You  looked  well,  but  sad,  in  one  of  your  white  muslin 
dressing  gowns,  and  you  were  just  about  to  sail  for  Liverpool  in  a 
packet  without  me.  Then  it  seemed  to  me  you  had  gone,  and  I  saw  the 
ship  sailing  away.  I  felt  dreadful,  and  woke  in  a  fright,  vowing  to 
myself  that  business  and  everything  else  might  go  to  the  dogs,  but  that 
if  I  were  once  with  you  again,  by  God's  blessing,  nothing  but  death 
should  part  us  ;  and,  bad  as  it  is  to  be  away  from  you  now,  at  least 
there  is  not  the  ocean  between  us,  and  that  is  some  comfort,  my 
beloved  one.  (A  deer  is  just  swimming  across  the  river  ahead 
of  us.) 

"  I  have  been  reading,  for  want  of  better,  '  The  White  Slave,'  a 
novel,  the  scene  of  which  is  laid  in  Russia.  It  is  written,  I  believe, 
by  the  Honorable  Mr.  Smythe  (a  son  of  Lord  Strangford),  M.  P. 
for  Canterbury.  It  is  pretty  interesting,  as  you  may  judge  when  I 
satup  till  near  midnight  reading  it  ;  but  I  hate  novels,  and  only  wish 
I  had  some  useful  book  to  read.  I  took  a  good  spell  at  the  Bible 
this  morning,  and  read,  as  I  always  do,  old  Jay.  Having  finished 
John's  Gospel,  I  am  reading  on  in  the  Acts.  I  think  on  January  i 
(God  willing)  I  will  begin  ist  chapter  Luke  and  read  on. 

"  Now  the  boat  is  moving  again  (we  have  just  been  wooding),  so 
I  must  stop.  I  thought  much  of  dear  John  Walter  yesterday  on  his 
journey  to  Philadelphia,  and  prayed  fervently  that  he  might  be  kept 
from  evil  and  from  temptation.  It  \s  four  weeks  past  on  Christmas 
since  I  left  you,  my  sweet  darling. 

"  Mobile,  Sunday,  December  28,  1845.  We  arrived  here  about  11 
A.  M.  to-day  safe  and  sound,  and  I  have  since  been  detained  looking 
for  rooms  and  writing  a  few  lines  to  Murray  Thomson.  I  intend 
to  stay  here  till  Tuesday  in  order  to  find  out  the  general  opinion 
about  the  cotton  crop.  I  am  now  standing  in  my  greatcoat  writing 
this  on  the  mattress  of  a  bed  without  sheets.     The  weather  is  clear 


142  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

and  cold.  My  room  is  pretty  large,  but  is  dusty  and  dirty,  in  a  sort 
of  offshoot  from  the  Mansion  House,  which  is  full.  I  was  in  the 
same  hotel  last  time  I  was  here.  It  is  quiet,  and  is  called  the 
Eutaw.  We  sleep  here  and  dine  at  the  Mansion  House.  I  am 
now  going  to  get  a  bath  and  general  cleansing  before  dinner,  which 
we  take  at  2  p.  m.,  and  as  the  mail  closes  early  to-day,  I  have  to  put 
this  in  it  before  dinner.     I  intend  to  go  to  church  after  dinner. 

"  God  forever  bless  you  and  my  darling  children.  I  have  much  to 
be  thankful  for  in  being  brought  so  near  the  end  of  my  journey  in 
health  and  happiness — that  is,  as  much  happiness  as  I  can  have 
away  from  you  and  my  darling  children.  God  grant  I  may  get  good 
news  of  you  when  I  reach  New  Orleans.  I  have,  of  course,  nothing 
later  from  you  than  December  7. 

"  I  had  some  interesting  conversation  last  night  with  two  old  JNIeth- 
odist  planters.  When  I  brought  out  my  Bible  and  read  before  the 
fire  in  the  steamer  to-day,  they  brought  out  the  one  his  Bible  and 
the  other  a  religious  book. 

"  Ever  thine  own  attached  "  Wm.  W." 

"  Mobile,  Sunday,  December  28,  1845. 
"  My  Darling  Harriet  : 

"  I  sent  off  No.  17  to  you  on  my  arrival  here  this  morning,  having 
added  a  few  lines  to  say  I  had  got  here  safe  and  sound.  After  din- 
ner we  went  to  a  Presbyterian  church,  but  the  minister  was  absent, 
very  few  people  there,  and  they  only  held  a  prayer  meeting.  The 
interior  of  the  church  was  large  and  handsome,  but  as  the  people  did 
not  speak  out  we  could  not  hear  a  word,  so,  after  sitting  out  two 
prayers  and  two  hymns,  we  took  our  departure  and  walked  into  the 
country.  There  is  frost,  but  not  hard  frost,  the  sun  bright  and  the 
sky  clear  as  crystal  ;  in  fact,  splendid  weather.  People  say  they  do 
not  recollect  seeing  so  severe  a  winter  in  the  South  since  '30,  so  I 
fear  it  must  have  been  dreadfully  cold  with  you.  My  bedroom  is 
now  quite  comfortable.  I  have  a  roaring  hickory  fire  and  two  little 
oil  lamps,  Tom  Sellar  having  brought  in  his.  My  ink  is  done,  so 
I  shall  now  go  and  read  the  Bible  and  some  hymns.  You  see  I  have 
nothing  to  tell  you,  only  I  just  like  to  sit  down  and  have  a  chat  with 
you,  you  dear,  dear  blessed  Harriet. 

"  I  suppose  John  Walter  will  be  at  Philadelphia  to-night, — may  God 


JOURNEY   TO   NEW   ORLEANS   CONCLUDED.  143 

keep  him  from  evil, — and  my  blessed  Charlotte  will  be  with  you, 
comforting  you,  and  dear,  sweet  Bessie,  to  whom  I  shall  send 
through  the  post  some  of  '  Macaulay's  Essays  '  and  his  *  Lays  of 
Rome,'  which  I  have  read  on  my  journey.  She  will  like  the  '  Life 
of  Warren  Hastings'  and  'Frederick  the  Great.'  I  wish  Charlotte 
would  read  them.  By  the  by,  while  I  recollect,  '  Arnold's  Sermons  ' 
have  just  been  published  by  Appleton  &  Co.  Send  and  buy  and 
read  them.     I  will  try  and  get  them  in  New  Orleans. 

"  How  is  my  dear  little  Harrie  ?  Can  she  spell  '  fatal,'  'venison  '  ? 
And  my  blessed  Willie  with  his  pug  nose,  and  little  Lady  Helen  ? 
Bless  them  all,  and  you,  too.  May  we  all  meet  in  health  and  happi- 
ness.     Good-tiight. 

"December  29,  1845.  To-day  the  news  by  the  Liverpool  steamer 
of  December  4  was  received  here.  I  shall  not  get  my  letters,  how- 
ever, till  I  reach  New  Orleans,  but  I  rejoice  to  see  by  the  papers  that 
Lord  John  Russell  and  Lord  Morpeth  have  come  out  in  favor  of  a 
total  repeal  of  the  corn  laws.  This  is  the  best  news  I  have  heard  this 
long  time.  I  see  there  has  been  a  great  meeting  in  the  Amphitheater 
in  Liverpool  ;  four  thousand  people  present.  Among  the  speak- 
ers were  dear  old  Dr.  Blackburn,  William  Rathbone,  etc.,  and 
if  we  live  six  months,  we  shall  see  the  day  when  we  shall  sing 
the  requiem  of  the  corn  laws.  '  Hurrah  !  three  cheers  for  total 
and  immediate  repeal  !  '  Cotton  in  Liverpool  is  down,  and  flour  in 
bond  is  likely  to  rise  with  a  repeal  of  the  corn  laws,  so  that  if  I 
had  made  the  news  it  could  not  have  been  more  in  accordance 
with  my  wishes  ;  and,  moreover,  every  chance  of  peace  being  pre- 
served between  the  two  countries.  Only  let  our  corn  laws  be 
repealed  and  the  American  tariff  reduced  to  a  revenue  standard 
(which  it  will  be  in  spite  of  Master  F.  G.  Foster !),  and  the  trade 
between  this  country  and  Great  Britain,  large  as  it  is  now,  will  be 
doubled  within  the  next  ten  or  fifteen  years. 

"  Although  very  frosty  this  morning,  the  weather  is  milder  this 
afternoon,  and  the  day  has  been  clear  and  beautiful.  After  dinner 
Sellar  and  I  and  a  Mr.  Littlejohn  took  a  walk  to  Choctaw  Point, 
down  on  the  sea  about  two  miles  from  Mobile  ;  and  a  beautiful 
country  walk  it  was  ;  there  is  nothing  equal  to  it  at  New  Orleans. 
The  fine,  clear,  bracing  weather  we  have  here  is  truly  delightful 
and  makes  one  have  a  pleasure  in  mere  existence. 


144  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  I  saw  Mr.  Hoppin  to-day.  He  is  no  longer  mayor,  and  looks 
rather  seedy.  He  tells  me  that  Mrs.  Humphreys,  at  the  date  of  his 
last  letter,  was  at  Brighton  under  the  medical  treatment  of  Sir 
James  Clarke. 

"  I  sent  '  Macaulay's  Essays '  to-day,  directed  to  '  Miss  Bessie 
Wood,  158,  New  York  Hotel,  New  York.'  I  wonder  if  they  will 
reach  her.  Please  tell  me.  I  shall  leave  this  open  till  to-morrow  to 
tell  you  what  sort  of  a  day  we  have  for  our  voyage  to  New  Orleans. 
Good-night,  my  dear  one. 

"Mobile,  December  30,  1845  (Tuesday).  This  is  a  beautiful  day, 
so  I  hope  we  shall  have  a  fine  passage  to  New  Orleans.  The  boat 
from  New  Orleans  is  not  in,  and  I  fear  the  letters  by  her  will  not  be 
delivered  until  after  we  leave  here.  In  that  case  I  shall  not  get 
your  letters,  or  at  least  one  of  them,  until  the  day  after  to-morrow,  as 
I  wrote  to  Murray  T.on  Sunday,  telling  him  if  there  were  more  than 
one  letter  from  you  to  send  on  here  the  first  received,  fully  expect- 
ing that  I  would  have  got  it  the  day  before  I  left. 

"  God  bless  you,  my  beloved  one,  and  all  my  dear  children.  Pray 
for  me  that  I  may  be  kept  from  evil  and  from  temptation,  and  may 
be  enabled  to  show  to  those  about  me  that  I  am  a  good  soldier  of 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and  that  I  may  be  kept  from  all  secret  sin  of 
mind  or  body.     God  forever  bless  you. 

"  Your  own  attached 

"  Wm.  W." 


CHAPTER   VIII. 

OPENING     OF     1846 — THE      SADDEST      YEAR     OF      MY      LIFE — LETTERS 
BETWEEN  ME  IN  NEW  ORLEANS  AND  MY  WIFE  IN  NEW  YORK. 

"New  Orleans,  December  31,  1845. 
"  My  Own  Sweet  Wife  : 

"  Here  I  am,  safe  and  sound,  thank  God,  and,  looking  back  upon 
my  journey,  I  am  sure  your  prayers  have  been  heard  and  answered 
on  my  behalf.  Sellar  has  more  than  once  remarked  how  fortunate 
we  have  been  in  our  sea  voyages,  and  also  with  regard  to  weather  on 
our  land  journeys. 

"  I  wrote  to  you  yesterday  from  Mobile.  We  had  from  thence 
a  very  pleasant  voyage,  the  sea  the  whole  way  as  smooth  as  a  lake  ; 
in  fact,  looking  as  if  it  had  been  frozen.  I  lay  on  a  sofa  berth,  and 
did  not  undress  last  night,  but  nevertheless  slept  well.  We  arrived 
at  Lake  Pontchartrain  before  daylight  this  morning,  and  saw  the 
sun  rise.  When  going  along  the  railway,  I  suppose  we  took  on  board 
no  less  than  twenty  deer  from  the  lake  end,  and  from  Mobile  we 
brought  quantities  of  splendid  wild  turkeys  for  the  New  Year's 
festivities  here.  When  I  arrived  at  No.  50  Chartres  Street,  Mylne 
and  Murray  Thomson  were  not  up,  so  I  deposited  my  baggage  and 
went  with  Sellar  to  the  office  to  deposit  his  there.  When  there, 
I  got  your  dear  letter  of  December  10,  and  that  is  the  only  letter 
which  has  come  here  for  me,  although  there  are  New  York  dates  of 
December  20  in  town.  I  do  hope,  my  darling,  that  this  does  not 
arise  from  your  being  ill,  but  only  from  not  thinking  I  would  be 
here  so  soon,  as  I  see  yours  of  December  10  was  intended  to  reach 
me  at  Savannah.  I  wish  you  would  send  me  on  any  of  Mary's  or 
Anna's  letters  which  you  have. 

"We  had  a  nice,  clean,  comfortable  breakfast  at  Murray's,  and 
after  that  I  went  up  to  my  room,  which  is  large  and  comfortable, 
with  clean  carpet,  pretty  washstand,  basins,  etc.,  and  foot  bath.  I 
have  left  myself  little  time  to  tell  you  that  I  am  well  here  before 


146  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

the  mail  closes.      I  see  I  shall  have  plenty  to  do,  which  I  am  well 
pleased  at. 

"  God  bless  that  dear  little  Willie  for  his  prayer  for  me,  the 
darling  pet.  As  soon  as  I  had  got  into  my  own  room  I  went  on  my 
knees  and  thanked  God  for  all  his  mercies  toward  me.  Pray  for 
me  that  I  may  be  moderate  in  business,  and  discreet  and  prudent. 
This  is  going  to  be  an  eventful  year,  and  may  result  in  great  loss  or 
great  gain,  so  pray  that  I  be  kept  from  evil  and  temptation.  Give 
my  love  to  all  my  dear  children.  Kiss  John  Walter,  Charlotte, 
Bessie,  Harrie,  Willie,  and  Helen  all  round  for  me. 

"  I  have  a  long  letter  from  John  Dennistoun  ;  he  and  Fanny  all 
safe  at  home  in  their  magnificent  house.  All  their  cliildren  well. 
James  and  Eliza  gone  to  the  Continent,  and  Robert  Dennistoun  was 
to  join  them  in  Paris  in  a  week.  Kindest  love  to  Maria  and  De 
Peyster  and  little  Em. 

"  In  haste,  ever  thine  own  attached  husband, 

"Wm.  W." 

"  New  Orleans,  December  31,  1845. 
"  My  Darling  Wife: 

"  I  have  already  written  you  to-day,  but  as  I  want  to  write  to  you 
again  to-morrow,  and  know  not  what  time  I  may  have,  I  take  time 
by  the  forelock  and  sit  down  to-night  to  my  labor  of  love.  Well, 
here  I  am  seated  in  Murray  and  Mylne's  dining  room  ;  they  are  both 
out  at  the  Pelican  Club  and  I  am  left  here  alone,  which  I  rather 
enjoy,  and  I  have  (after  concocting  certain  business  letters  to  be 
written  to-morrow)  just  read  your  dear  letter  of  the  loth  inst.  over 
again.  I  fancy  you  have  sent  a  subsequent  letter  to  Columbus,  and 
it  may  probably  be  three  or  four  days  before  it  reaches  me.  I  am 
rejoiced  to  see  that  dear  Charlotte  has  gained  three  places  in  her 
class,  and  I  am  glad  to  see  that  Captain  Comstock  is  taking  proper 
care  of  you.  How  I  should  have  liked  to  be  with  you  on  Christmas, 
and  to  have  seen  all  the  dear  little  faces  so  happy  when  they  came 
into  your  room  and  saw  the  gifts,  and  dear  little  Lady  Helen,  with 
her  look  of  bewilderment  ! 

"  I  went  with  Sellar  to  the  St.  Charles  to-day,  but  found  it  full, 
so  took  him  to  the  St.  Louis,  which  looks  clean  and  nice,  and  much 
quieter  than  the  St.  Charles.     I   saw  Mme.   Hawley  and  Mr.  De 


OPENING   OF    1846 — THE   SADDEST   YEAR   OF   MY   LIFE.      I47 

Jalais,  who  both  asked  very  kindly  after  you,  and  madame  expressed 
great  regret  that  you  were  not  to  be  here  this  winter.  De  Jalais  told 
me  that  a  woman  had  been  here  asking  after  Carr  with  two  children, 
which  she  said  were  his  and  that  she  was  his  wife,  but  that  he  did 
not  believe  she  was.*  After  dinner  Mylne,  Sellar,  and  I  took  a 
walk  along  the  Levee,  and  in  coming  home  (past  Lafayette  Square, 
which  looks  well)  I  saw  Thompson  &  Co.'s  coal  yard,  so  I  went  in 
and  asked  about  Carr.  Mr.  Thompson  said  that  Carr  and  his  wife 
[Mary  Brown]  left  this  for  Louisville  and  Cincinnati  on  August  8  ; 
that  if  he  (Carr)  had  chosen  he  might  have  cheated  Thompson  & 
Co.  out  of  two  to  three  thousand  dollars,  but  he  had  left  everything 
correct,  and  had  said  he  wanted  the  situation  kept  open  for  him, 
and  he  would  return  in  the  fall,  and  would  also  write  from  Louis- 
ville ;  that  he  has  not  returned  and  has  never  written.  Thompson 
also  said  a  woman  with  two  children  had  come  out  here  after  him 
and  said  she  was  his  wife ;  but  he  (Thompson)  did  not  believe  it, 
from  the  account  some  passengers  gave  of  her  on  the  voyage  out. 
Mary  Brown's  clothes  are  still  at  Thompson  &  Co.'s,  and  a  letter  has 
come  out  to  me  by  the  last  steamer  from  her  sister,  a  Mrs.  Elcock, 
asking  for  some  account  of  her,  as  they  had  heard  nothing  from  her 
since  last  March,  and  did  not  know  what  had  become  of  her  !  Some 
of  Thompson  &  Co.'s  workpeople  saw  Carr  in  Louisville  or  Cin- 
cinnati last  autumn,  and  Carr  had  not  then  got  any  situation. 

"  It  seems  from  John  D.'s  letter  to  me  that  he  has  been  blowing 
up  Cross  for  not  replying  minutely  to  the  queries  in  my  letters,  and 
he  also  gives  me  a  scolding  for  not  condensing  my  letters  more,  which 
would  the  more  readily  enable  Cross  to  reply  to  them  categorically. 
There  is  a  good  deal  of  truth  in  this,  but  at  the  same  time  my  letters 
have  necessarily  been  so  much  about  the  details  of  business  that  it 
was  almost  impossible  to  make  them  otherwise  than  prolix.  More- 
over, I  have  felt  so  much  the  want  of  details  in  business  letters  from 
them  that  I  have  thought  /  could  not  give  them  too  many. 

"  Good-night,  my  dearest.  Blessings  on  thee  and  my  darling 
children.     Good-by  till  next  year. 

"  January  i,  1846.  Many,  many  happy  years  to  you,  my  blessed 
wife,  and  to  my  darling  children.     God  has  been  very  gracious  to  us 

*  Carr  was  a  man  who  had  married  Mary  Brown,  a  nursemaid  of  Mrs.  Wood's, 
during  the  winter  the  family  spent  in  New  Orleans. 


148  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

all  during  the  past  year,  and,  oh,  may  he  continue  his  loving  kind- 
ness to  us  all  during  the  present  one,  and,  if  it  be  his  blessed  will,, 
spare  us  all  to  each  other,  and  cause  us  each  and  all  to  grow  in 
grace  and  in  the  knowledge  of  our  Lord  and  Saviour  Jesus  Christ. 

"  I  find  Sellar  has  no  Bible  with  him  here,  so  as  soon  as  I  can  get 
my  letters  closed  for  the  mail  I  am  going  out  to  buy  him  one. 

"  We  breakfast  at  half  past  eight  and  I  am  like  to  have  all  the 
evenings  to  myself.  Sellar  will  depart  for  the  sugar  country  on 
Saturday  probably.  I  prayed  for  you  all  this  morning  before  break- 
fast. Began  Luke  and  Jay  for  January  i.  Now,  this  is  a  shorts 
unsatisfactory  scrawl,  but  I  have  not  time  even  for  this.  I  will 
not  write  to  you  again  before  Monday,  5th  inst.  God  forever 
bless  you  and  my  dear  ones.  As  the  mails  are  very  irregular,  don't 
be  alarmed  at  not  hearing  from  me  regularly. 

"  Ever  thine  own  attached  husband, 

"Wm.  W." 

"  New  York,  January  i,  1846. 
"  My  Beloved  William  : 

"  A  happy  New  Year  to  you  and  to  all  of  us,  and  may  we  soon 
meet  in  this  happy  year,  never  more  in  this  world  to  be  separated 
except  for  a  few  days.  Your  precious  letter  of  December  23-24^ 
written  on  steamer  Emily  (No.  15  from  Appalachicola  has  not  yet 
arrived),  and  finished  at  Columbus  on  Christmas  Day,  reached  me 
this  morning,  and,  oh,  it  was  balm  and  cordial  to  me,  though  I 
regret  you  should  have  had  to  return  to  Columbus,  thereby  delaying 
the  time  of  your  reaching  New  Orleans,  for  I  feel  as  if  I  could  not 
give  you  up  longer  than  the  middle  of  March  at  furthest  Since  I  last 
wrote  to  you,  which  was  on  Friday,  26th  (finished  Saturday,  Decem- 
ber 27),  much  has  occurred,  and  much  for  which  your  presence  and 
counsel  were  needed  ;  but  I  have  had  very  kind  friends  in  your 
absence,  of  whom,  in  the  male  line,  Mr.  De  Peyster  and  Uncle 
Philip  Hone  and  Sam  Rowland  have  been  chief.  Let  me  relieve 
your  anxiety  by  saying  that  our  dear  John  Walter,  who  went,  as  you 
know,  on  Saturday  morning,  took  ill  that  night  at  Philadelphia,  and 
instead  of  coming  home  yesterday,  as  I  expected,  a  letter  came  from 
him  instead,  written  like  a  drunken  man,  and  just  stating  that  he 
was  ill  in  bed  and  the  doctor  did  not  yet  know  what  it  was  that  ailed 


OPENING   OF    1846 — THE   SADDEST   YEAR   OF   MY   LIFE.      I49 

him.  Another  came  at  the  same  time  from  Tom  Kane  to  Mr.  De 
Peyster,  inclosing  to  him  the  particulars,  which  I  did  not  see.  I 
was  dining  at  Maria'-s  with  Charlotte  and  Bessie,  expecting  each  ring 
would  bring  dear  J.  W.,  and  they  never  gave  me  the  letter  till  after 
they  had  fortified  me  with  a  good  dinner  and  a  glass  of  wine.  I  had 
previously  heard  from  J.  W.,  who  wrote  on  Saturday  evening  the 
moment  he  arrived,  telling  me  he  was  quite  well,  and  had  received 
such  a  kind  welcome,  and  that  a  party  was  to  be  given  that  night  in 
honor  of  him.  I  felt  very  ill,  as  you  may  suppose,  when  I  got  his 
second  letter,  and  Mr.  De  Peyster  brought  me  home  at  seven  o'clock, 
and  was  kindness  itself, 

"  He  came  in  and  drew  my  cherry  brandy  and  raspberry  brandy 
for  me,  having  brought  a  corkscrew  with  him,  and  saw  that  my 
decanters  were  in  order  for  to-day.  The  reasons  for  my  remaining 
at  home  and  seeing  company  after  all  were  these  :  Anna  Winthrop, 
at  whose  house  we  were  to  dine  to-day,  was  fearful  her  Gertrude 
had  taken  whooping  cough,  and  as  there  was  a  possibility  that  she 
had,  I  would  not  go.  I  did  not  want  to  go  to  Maria's,  for  she 
sees  such  a  world  of  people,  and  my  spirits  were  not  equal  to 
seeing  a  crowd  ;  neither  did  I  feel  sufficiently  strong,  and  also  I  was 
glad  to  remain  at  home  and  run  in  and  out  to  see  my  darlings.  Well, 
this  morning  dear  Johnny  Hone,  who  has  been  another  dear,  kind 
friend  to  me,  went  down  to  the  post  office  early,  and  brought  the 
third  letter  from  dear  J.  W.,  written  in  a  firmer  hand,  better  spirits, 
and  better  in  every  way.  He  says  that  the  doctor  thinks  his  disease 
varioloid,  but  cannot  tell,  but  that  whatever  it  is  it  is  very  slight, 
(I  think  it  measles,  taken  from  the  Winthrops,  and  have  no  doubt 
about  the  matter.)  He  complained  chiefly  of  the  dark  room,  his 
low  diet,  and  doses  of  castor  oil,  but  says  Tom  is  most  affectionate 
and  kind  ;  that  he  reads  the  Bible  to  him  every  day,  and  has  left 
his  own  room  to  sleep  in  the  one  next  to  his,  and  that  he  sleeps 
with  a  string  tied  round  his  wrist  which  is  fastened  to  J.  W.'s  bedpost 
that  he  may  waken  him  whenever  he  wants  anything  ;  that  the  doc- 
tor thinks  he  will  be  able  to  return  home  in  three  or  four  days,  and 
that  he  only  wants  now  nursing  and  care,  with  strict  diet,  and  to  be 
kept  in  a  dark  room.  There  was  also  another  letter  from  Tom  to 
Mr.  De  Peyster  confirming  what  J.  W.  says  of  himself.  Mr.  De 
Peyster  had  promised,  if  he  were  not  better,  to  go  on  to-morrow  to 


150  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Philadelphia  to  see  him,  and  Maria,  too,  had  offered  to  go  if  I  wished 
it.  This  letter  from  dear  J.  W.  comforted  me  not  a  little,  and  then 
yours,  too,  brought  by  John  Yuille,  made  my  heart  light  and  thank- 
ful.    It  is  very  late,  and  I  will  finish  to-morrow. 

"January  2,  1846.  My  other  reason  for  seeing  company  at  all 
(contrary,  as  you  know,  to  my  wish)  was  this  :  partly  to  gratify  dear 
Charlotte  and  Elizabeth,  who  wanted  very  much  to  see  what  sort  of 
a  thing  it  was,  and  partly  because  I  had  no  place  to  hide  myself  if 
I  remained  at  home — our  parlor  being  so  handy  that  many  would 
just  open  the  door  and  come  in  ;  and  so,  if  dressed,  and  cake  and 
wine  ready,  I  might  better  see  all  who  came  at  once.  My  cake  and 
wine  cost  me  only  $3-75.  I  had  a  bottle  of  cherry  and  raspberry,  best, 
a  large  iced  fruit  cake,  and  a  silver  cake  basket  of  Maria's  filled 
with  macaroons  and  New  Year's  cake.  We  had  all  our  little  knick- 
knacks  out,  and  the  room  looked  very  nice,  having  been  beautifully 
cleaned.  Charlotte  looked  very  well  in  her  crimson  silk,  while  lace 
hand  ruffles  of  mamma's,  white  kid  gloves,  her  aunt's  hair  bracelet, 
worn  for  the  first  time,  her  hair  tied  up  with  crimson  ribbon,  and 
white  lace  upon  the  neck  of  the  dress.  Bess  also  looked  well,  for 
her.  Sweet  Helen  had  on  her  scarlet  merino  dress,  with  its  very  long 
waist,  fitting  her  beautifully,  and  her  long  fair  hair  curling  down 
her  back,  and  her  cheeks  like  roses  ;  I  never  saw  her  or  any  other 
child  look  so  sweet.  But  the  little  ones  were  in  the  nursery,  and  no 
one  asked  to  see  them  but  Mr.  Waddington,  Dawson,  and  Neilson. 
Margaret  Hone  sat  with  us,  and  she  saw  the  little  ones,  too,  but  that 
was  all.  Your  old  lady  had  a  good  color,  first  from  crying  when 
writing  to  dear  J.  W.,  then  from  a  mixture  from  a  flush  of  excitement 
from  reading  your  dear  letter  and  a  glass  of  raspberry  taken  to 
fortify  me.  Thirty-six  called  in  all,  counting  the  family,  which, 
considering  I  gave  out  very  generally  I  was  not  to  be  at  home,  was 
pretty  well.  Old  Woolsey  Rogers  called,  George  Hoffman  (my  old 
adorer),  William  Maitland,  Mr.  Russell  (the  elder),  not  Anna  R.'s 
husband,  Delancey  Kane,  Oddie,  Dixon,  Mr.  Jenks,  who  praised 
Johnny  very  highly,  and  whom  I  asked  to  come  and  see  me  some 
evening,  James  De  Peyster,  B.  H.  Field,  Brodhead,  and  others. 

"  Now  comes  my  other  reason  for  not  staying  incog,  in  my  bedroom 
or  nursery,  and  my  other  trouble  :  my  nursery  and  parlor  both  began 
to  smoke  together.     From  the  time  of  the  taking  fire  of  the  parlor 


OPENING   OF    1846 — THE    SADDEST   YEAR   OF   MY   LIFE.      151 

chimney  the  parlor  not  only  smoked,  but  for  three  days  the  smoke 
came  down  in  gusts,  and  blew  the  fire  fairly  out  of  the  grate,  and 
us  out  of  the  room.  The  firemen  would  not  come  to  put  the  fire  on 
in  the  morning  till  insisted  on  by  the  authorities  of  the  house,  for 
they  knew  the  consequence,  and  the  chambermaids  would  not  come 
to  clean  the  room,  for  they  knew  it  was  labor  lost.  I  sent  to  know  if 
a  fire  could  be  put  on  in  my  bedroom  and  have  our  meals  there,  but 
they  said  that  chimney  was  the  worst  of  any,  so  Samuel  set  the 
table  and  we  ran  in  like  frightened  geese,  and  got  our  plates  filled 
and  ran  off  with  them,  and  ate  on  our  laps  or  chairs,  as  we  best 
could,  in  the  nursery.  After  trying  hard  coal,  keeping  up  the  blower 
till  red  hot,  and  all  other  expedients  had  failed,  we  gave  up  trying 
and  let  the  fire  alone,  so  we  had  the  cold  room,  and  a  horrible  smell 
of  back  smoke. 

"  The  nursery  fortunately  smoked  but  little  in  our  worst  days  in 
the  parlor,  but  the  day  before  our  chimney  was  swept  it  began  and 
burst  forth  in  all  directions,  from  the  grate,  stovepipe,  and  back  fire- 
board,  and  the  children  were  driven  forth  from  there.  My  patience 
was  now  taxed  to  the  utmost.  I  had  sent  to  Captain  Comstock  to 
tell  the  state  of  matters,  and  to  demand  another  room  immediately, 
if  only  to  eat  or  sit  down  in.  The  children  were  black  as  soot, 
and  Whitman  [clerk  of  the  hotel]  stood  like  the  statue  of  Melan- 
choly, and  said  everything  had  been  done  that  could  be  done.  I 
then  sent  for  Captain  Comstock  to  come  to  me,  and  for  the  sec- 
ond time  harangued  him  eloquently  upon  the  impropriety  of  any 
decent  family  being  in  such  a  state  for  a  moment.  He  said  the 
sweeps  were  coming  that  day  to  sweep  both  chimneys,  and  that 
the  manufacturer  (probably  architect)  was  to  come  to  see  the  state 
of  the  building,  if  anything  was  wrong  with  the  chimneys,  and  if 
any  other  ventilator  for  the  top  would  do  good.  I  said  that  of 
course  we  could  not  remain  in  the  house  if  something  were  not 
done  immediately — other  rooms  on  the  second  floor  given  us  or  these 
chimneys  altered.  He  said  he  saw  that  plainly,  and  regretted 
much  that  I  was  in  such  discomfort  ;  to  add  to  my  misery  the 
vexation  and  annoyance  brought  on  severe,  sharp  pains.  This  was 
on  Saturday  and  Sunday  last,  and  I  could  not,  of  course,  leave  the 
uncomfortable  house  either  to  go  to  Maria's  or  to  church.  I  spent 
a  miserable  Sunday,  feeling  very  ill  and  with  no  fire  in  my  room. 


152  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

expecting  and  fearing  the  children  were  to  have  measles,  for 
Willie  and  Helen  were  both  complaining,  and  not  knowing  where 
to  go  if  we  had  to  go.  Mr.  De  Peyster  and  Uncle  Philip  Hone 
now  took  the  matter  in  their  own  hands,  and  told  Captain  C.  we 
must  go  if  not  attended  to  and  other  rooms  given  at  once.  Other 
rooms  are  promised  in  the  second  story  next  week,  if  I  choose  to 
take  them.  In  the  meantime  the  chimneys  have  been  swept,  and 
the  rooms  thoroughly  scoured  and  cleansed.  It  was  found  that  they 
never  had  been  swept  since  the  house  was  built,  and  were  choked 
up  with  soot,  that  a  brick  was  also  misplaced  in  the  parlor,  and 
that  the  ventilators  at  the  top  were  rusted  and  would  not  act,  or 
turn  with  the  wind.  We  have  now  the  comfort  of  seeing  a  cheer- 
ful fire  of  Liverpool  coal  (for  we  were  choked  with  the  sulphur 
before)  in  both  rooms,  and  only  occasionally  a  puff  of  smoke  from 
each  chimney,  say  about  three  a  day,  but  not  bad  enough  for  us  to 
open  the  windows  or  drive  us  out  of  the  room.  On  Monday  I 
went  to  Maria's  to  spend  the  day,  Charlotte  has  written  to  J. 
Walter  to-day  a  lively  letter,  and  I  have  written  to  Mrs.  Kane. 

"  Bessie  sends  you  this  mark  for  your  Bible  as  a  New  Year's  gift. 
Bessie  bought  the  material  with  some  of  her  Christmas  money  and 
worked  this  all  herself. 

"  I  am  sorry  to  cross  this,  but  I  have  so  much  to  say  that  I  have 
not  time  to  say  God  bless  you  at  the  end,  and  these  little  postscripts 
at  the  top  will  bother  you  more  than  crossing,  I  fear.  God  bless  you, 
my  precious  husband  ;  I  feel  that  God  is  good  and  wise  in  all  he  does 
for  us,  and  even  dear  J.  W.'s  illness  away  has  perhaps  spared  the 
others  getting  ill  till  our  smoke  was  cured,  and  I  able  to  nurse  them. 
Powell  is  nearly  well  again. 

"  Thine  own  devoted  wife." 

"50  Chartres  Street,  New  Orleans, 

"January  4,  1846. 
"  My  Blessed  Wife  : 

"  I  am  still  without  any  later  letters  from  you  than  that  of  Decem- 
ber 10.  To  be  sure,  the  mail  has  failed  this  morning  from  beyond 
Montgomery,  but  if  the  mail  comes  regularly  through  to-morrow  and 
next  day,  and  I  do  not  hear,  I  shall  be  very  anxious,  and  yet  surely, 
if  you   or  the  children  had  been  ill,  either  J.  Walter,  Charlotte,  or 


OPENING   OF    1846 — THE   SADDEST   YEAR   OF   MY   LIFE.       1 53 

Maria  would  have  written  to  me,  sol  will  e'en  'hope  on,  hope  ever.' 

"  I  have  just  returned  from  Dr.  Scott's  church,  where  I  partook  of 
the  Lord's  Supper.  The  church  was  well  filled  by  a  respectable  con- 
gregation. I  sat  in  Mr.  P.  Maxwell's  seat  just  across  the  aisle  from 
our  old  one,  and  I  think  I  have  not  felt  so  much  at  home  in  a  church 
since  I  left  New  Orleans.  There  is  an  earnestness  and  sincerity 
about  Dr.  Scott  which  carry  you  with  him,  even  although  you  wish 
that  his  references  to  '  heathen  Greek  and  Babylonish  '  were  a  little 
more  rare.  The  text  was  :  '  For  as  Moses  lifted  up  the  serpent  in 
the  wilderness,  even  so  must  the  Son  of  Man  be  lifted  up.'  One 
thing  he  noted  as  curious,  and  it  certainly  is  :  that  ^^Esculapius,  the 
god  of  physic,  should  have  had  a  brazen  serpent  as  his  symbol. 
Also,  that  God,  who  forbade  the  making  of  graven  images,  should 
expressly  order  the  serpent  to  be  made.  It  was  not,  however,  in  any 
way  intended  to  be  worshiped,  for  he  said  that  seven  hundred  years 
later,  in  the  reign  of  Hezekiah,  when  the  Jews  began  to  regard  the 
brazen  serpent  as  a  god  and  to  worship  it,  God  commanded  it  to  be 
destroyed. 

"  When  we  as  sinners  find  our  condition  hopeless,  cureless,  and, 
turning  to  the  Son  of  God,  cry  :  '  Lord,  have  mercy  upon  me  a 
sinner,'  we  feel  ourselves  like  the  serpent-bitten  Israelites,  and  like 
the  woman  whom  our  Saviour  healed  ;  that  we  are  freed  from  that 
plague  of  sin  and  clothed  in  the  robes  of  Christ's  righteousness. 

"The  singing  was  as  good  as  ever,  and  some  of  the  hymns  very 
pretty.  One  was  :  '  'Twas  on  that  dark  and  doleful  night.'  The 
church  goes  in  at  seven  this  evening,  and  I  intend  to  go.  There  is 
a  prayer  meeting  at  4  p.  m.,  to  which  I  don't  intend  to  go.  There 
were  15  people  added  to  the  church — 10  from  other  churches,  and 
5  on  examination.  The  New  Orleans  Bible  Society  since  its  institu- 
tion in,  I  think,  March,  1843,  has  distributed  10,000  Bibles,  of  which 
upward  of  7000  have  been  sold,  the  rest  given.  May  God  prosper 
the  good  work  !  even  where  Satan's  seat  is,  as  one  of  the  ministers 
who  prayed  said  of  New  Orleans,  rather  more  bluntly  than  politely. 
After  all,  I  suspect  it  is  not  so  much  behind  its  sister  cities  in  this 
country  and  in  Europe  as  many  believe.  Prayer  meetings  and 
Bible  classes  seem  to  be  in  active  operation. 

"  My  last  was  finished  and  sent  off  on  the  ist  inst.  I  called  with 
Sellar  that  day  on  Helen  Nicholson,  and  was  very  graciously  received 


154  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

both  by  her  and  her  husband.  She  had  a  regular  levee  of  gentlemen 
paying  their  respects.  Afterward  Sellar  and  I  and  a  Mr.  Mills,  a 
Glasgow  man,  took  a  walk  along  Canal  Street,  past  old  Dr. 
McCaula3''s  school,  but  it  came  on  to  rain,  and  so  we  had  to  go 
home.  Sellar  dined  at  50  Chartres  Street,  as  he  did  also  on  the  2d. 
I  bought  him  a  very  prettily  bound  Bible  for  $1.50,  and  wrote  on 
the  title-page:  'Thomas  Sellar,  from  his  friend  Harriet  A.  Wood, 
January,  i,  1846.'     I  thought  of  writing  below  : 

"  Within  this  sacred  volume  lies 
The  mystery  of  mysteries. 
Happiest  he  of  human  race 
To  whom  God  has  granted  grace 
To  read,  to  watch,  to  fast  and  pray, 
To  lift  the  latch  and  force  the  way  ; 
But  happier  had  he  ne'er  been  born 
Than  read  to  laugh,  or  laugh  to  scorn ' — 

but  on  second  thought  I  decided  that  any  human  writing  recom- 
mendatory of  the  Bible  was  something  like  Uzziah  putting  forth  his 
hand  to  prevent  the  Ark  of  the  Testimony  being  shaken  when  it 
was  on  its  way  to  the  house  of  Obed-edom,  the  Gittite,  so  I  let  it 
alone.  Sellar  seemed  much  gratified  by  your  remembrance  of  him, 
and  as  he  had  not  a  Bible  with  him,  I  trust  that  the  good  seed  now 
sown  may  take  root  and  bring  forth  fruits  meet  for  repentance,  I 
inclose  a  note  which  Sellar  asked  me  to  send  to  you  ;  he  left  New 
Orleans  yesterday  for  the  sugar  country,  and  may  possibly  be  a 
week  or  two,  or  even  a  month,  there,  but  don't  say  to  anyone  where 
he  is,  or  what  he  is  about — just  that  he  is  not  in  New  Orleans,  but 
attending  to  some  business  in  the  country.  He  went  up  with  a  Mr. 
Key,  a  planter  who  bought  one  of  our  plantations,  and  quite  a  gen- 
tlemanly man.     He  will  be  at  Pelton's  in  the  course  of  his  tour. 

"  By  the  way,  we  expect  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Lyall  here  ;  they  have  letters 
to  our  house  [A.  &  J.  Dennistoun  &  Co.],  and  are  making  a  second 
tour  through  the  United  States.  Have  you  heard  or  seen  anything 
of  the  Spencers  ?  I  was  asked  to-day  to  dine  with  Mr.  Mills  to  eat  a 
wild  turkey,  but,  of  course,  declined.  The  weather  to-day  is  per- 
fection, like  a  fine  balmy  spring  or  summer  day  in  England. 

"  My  precious  little  Willie's  prayer  '  for  our  other  dear  father'  has 


OPENING   OF    1846 — THE    SADDEST   YEAR   OF   MY   LIFE.      1 55 

moved  me  more  than  anything  I  have  heard  this  long  time,  and 
almost  brings  the  tears  to  my  eyes  when  I  think  of  it.  How 
thankful  I  felt  to-day  in  church  in  thinking  that  you  and  my  dear 
John  Walter,  Charlotte,  Bessie,  Harrie,  Willie,  and  Helen  were  all 
under  the  watchful  eye  of  our  Father  in  heaven,  and  that  he  had 
given  me  grace  to  desire  one  thing  supereminently  for  my  children, 
and  that  is  that  they  all  may  be  heirs  of  eternal  life,  and  have  their 
inheritance  with  the  saints.  With  firm  trust  in  God,  and  with  sound 
minds  in  sound  bodies,  their  earthly  inheritance  is  of  very  minor 
importance. 

"  I  continue  to  be  much  bothered  about  staying  in  this  country,  if 
we  be  spared,  or  returning  to  England.  There  are  many  induce- 
ments to  remain,  and  a  good  many  to  go  back  to  England.  I  think 
I  would  like  to  stay  another  year,  so  as  to  see  how  we  would  like 
New  York  in  winter  if  we  were  all  there  together  ;  but  if  I  did  this, 
I  would  require  to  go  home  for  two  or  three  months,  say  on  July  16, 
and  return  by  steamer,  October  4.  Don't  speak  of  this,  or  write  of 
it,  to  anyone,  but  let  me  know  fully  what  you  think  of  the  matter 
yourself,  and  pray  that  God  will  guide  us.  I  can't  tell  you  how  dear 
and  precious  you  are  to  me,  my  dear  beloved  one,  and  how  I  long  to 
clasp  you  again  to  my  heart,  and  to  kiss  all  my  dear  children.  I  find 
I  like  them,  and  that  they  are  dearer  to  me  than  I  could  have  believed, 
so  that  I  have  a  liking  to  all  little  brats  of  children  I  see  for  their 
sakes. 

"I  am  again  neck  and  crop  into  the  Arkansas  lands  business,  and 
a  good  deal  bothered  about  the  same,  John  Slidell  having  gone  off  as 
United  States  Minister  to  Mexico  without  signing  an  important  paper. 
I  should  not  wonder  if  I  should  have  to  go  up  to  Natchez  to  see  old 
Jefferson  Davis  about  those  infernal  lands.  I  have  got  beautiful 
maps  made  of  them,  and  I  really  do  believe  that  some  day,  barring 
the  curse  of  slavery,  Arkansas  will  be  the  finest  State  in  the  Union. 
It  certainly  has  some  of  the  finest  land  and  most  picturesque  scenery.* 

*In  my  Memorandum  Book  under  date  of  Jamia7-y  5,  1846,  referring  to  their 
careless  bookkeeping,  I  say  :  "It  seems  to  me  that  all  that  has  been  done  for  our 
two  partners  here  has  had  very  little  effect  in  exciting  them  to  energy  in  look- 
ing after  these  old  affairs.  I  am  by  no  means  sure  that  it  might  not  be  the  part 
of  prudent  men  for  my  uncles  to  sell  off  their  assets  in  this  part  of  the  world  for 
what  they  will  bring,  and  close  the  house  here." 


156  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

It  is  now  3  P.  M.,  and  I  see  the  table  is  set  for  dinner,  which  I  sup- 
pose I  shall  take  in  company  with  my  own  noble  self,  as  I  fancy 
Mylne  and  Murray  T.  are  to  dine  out.     Good-by  for  the  present. 

"  Both  Murray  T.  and  Mylne  have  just  come  in  to  dinner,  and 
bring  word  of  one  of  the  tugboats  having  been  blown  up  and  several 
people  killed. 

"  Monday,  January  5,  1846.  There  is  a  letter  of  December  24  here 
to-day  from  the  New  York  house,  but  not  a  scrape  of  a  pen  from 
you  yet,  later  than  December  10.  I  fancy  you  must  have  thought  I 
would  not  be  here  before  January  8,  and  so  have  delayed  writing  till 
after  Christmas.  1  should  feel  very  uneasy,  but  D.  &  Co.  do  not  say 
that  you  or  any  of  the  children  are  ill,  so  I  hope  '  no  news  is  good 
news.'  Do  write  to  me  every  Sunday  and  Wednesday,  as  I  intend 
to  write  to  you,  sending  off  my  letters  on  Monday  and.  Thursday  ; 
but  as  the  mails  are  very  irregular,  you  must  not  expect  to  get  my 
letters  as  regularly  as  they  may  be  written.  This  is  a  gloomy, 
rainy  day.     God  forever  bless  you  and  my  dear  children. 

"  I  was  at  Dr.  Scott's  church  last  evening,  which  was  well  filled. 
Sermon  so-so.  I  hear  that  Dr.  Hawks  was  very  eloquent  and  im- 
pressive yesterday  morning. 

"  Thine  own  "  Wm.  W." 


CHAPTER  IX. 

WM.  W.  IN  NEW  ORLEANS,  AND  H.  A.  W.  IN  NEW  YORK,  DIS- 
CUSSING A  FUTURE  WHICH  GOD  DECIDED  FAR  OTHERWISE  THAN 
THEY    ANTICIPATED. 

Partly  in  reference  to  the  concluding  paragraph  of  the  last 
chapter  of  this  interminable  autobiography,  I  now  introduce  some 
extracts  from  an  important  letter  written  to  me  by  William  Cross, 
representing  himself  and  the  two  senior  partners,  Alexander  and 
John  Dennistoun,  dated  April  19,  1845.  It  ought  to  have  been 
entered  before  my  second  journey  to  New  Orleans,  but  as  it  has  not 
been,  it  will  come  in  here  appropriately  enough. 

"  Your  last  letter  to  the  '  trio,'  as  you  say,  was  a  sufficient  dose, 
but  we  now  know  really  more  of  these  New  Orleans  affairs  than 
we  should  have  known  in  twenty  years  had  you  not  gone  out. 

"  If  the  New  Orleans  house  could  be  depended  on,  they  might 
keep  the  mill  going  in  the  same  way  as  the  Liverpool  and  New 
York  houses  are  doing,  but  the  fearful  way  in  which  they  have 
thrown  away  money  rather  appalls  one  as  to  their  future  proceedings. 

"  You  must  yourself  decide  as  to  coming  home  this  year  or  next, 
as,  of  course,  ji'<?/^  can  judge  best  on  this  point  ;  whichever  you  do, 
the  seniors  and  I  owe  you  a  heavy  debt  of  gratitude  for  what  you 
have  already  done  in  investigating  matters.  I  wish  we  had  a  com- 
petent man  to  look  solely  to  these  old  matters,  and  leave  us  to  carry 
on  with  spirit  current  business,  which  will  now  for  a  long  while  be 
reasonably  profitable,  and  we  should  not  lose  golden  opportunities 
by  harassing  ourselves  about  a  set  of  scoundrelly  debtors  from 
whom,  after  all  our  trouble,  little  may  be  got." 

I  now  resume  the  thread  of  my  narrative  for  1846. 

"  New  Orleans,  January  5,  1846. 
"  My  Darling  Harriet  : 

"  I  sent  off  No.  22  to  you  this  morning,  but  forgot  to  say  that  last 
night  and  this  morning  I  had  pretty  nearly  made  up  my  mind  that  it 

IS7 


158  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

would  be  better,  if  we  all  be  spared,  to  return  to  Liverpool  in  the 
summer,  but  I  waver  about  like  a  weathercock  on  this  subject,  and 
never  continue  in  one  stay  for  two  days  or  half  a  day  together. 

"  I  find  that  there  are  New  York  papers  of  December  25  and  26 
in  town,  and  I  have  looked  over  the  '  deaths  '  and  '  dreadful  acci- 
dents,' but  as  I  neither  saw  you  nor  any  of  the  children  mentioned 
in  either  category,  I  am  at  a  loss  to  account  for  my  having  nothing 
later  from  you  than  December  10.  I  fancy  you  must  have  written 
to  me  at  Columbus,  and  that  the  letter  has  not  been  forwarded  ;  but 
as  you  certainly  expected  I  would  be  here  on  January  8,  at  latest,  I 
wonder  that  I  have  not  ere  this  received  a  letter  direct  to  New 
Orleans.  However,  I  may  just  wonder  and  begin  again,  for  any 
good  that  will  do. 

"  I  am  sitting  in  the  dining  room  at  50  Chartres  Street  before  a 
cheerful  fire,  and  with  a  lamp  and  candle  on  the  table.  Murray 
Thomson  and  Mylne  are  both  out.  I  did  not  leave  the  office  till 
after  eight,  then  went  to  the  reading  room  and  read  the  New  York 
and  Philadelphia  papers.  It  is  a  very  wet  night.  I  have  got  an  invita- 
tion to  dinner  at  Nicholson's  at  5  p.  m.  on  Wednesday,  7th  inst.,  and 
I  have  written  a  note  accepting. 

"  Murray  and  I  took  a  long  walk  yesterday  afternoon  down  the 
Levee  to  the  end  of  the  third  municipality,  and  then  up,  and  home 
by  Royal  Street.  The  evening  was  lovely.  The  Mississippi  is  very 
low  at  present. 

"  At  last,  dearest,  your  long-expected  and  welcome  letter  of 
December  26-27  has  arrived.  You  could  not  be  '  a  better  and 
more  deserving  wife  '  if  you  tried  ;  you  are  all  I  want  ;  I  would  not 
have  you  changed  an  iota. 

"  I  might,  as  Maria  says,  have  stood  up  at  that  bad  prayer  at 
Savannah,  but  if  I  had,  it  would  only  have  been  on  the  same  princi- 
ple as  Naaman  bowed  in  the  house  of  Rimmon,  and  with  the 
mental  reservation  :  '  The  Lord  pardon  thy  servant  in  this  thing.' 
I  am  not  sure  but  that  it  is  right  to  show  your  disapprobation. 
I  think,  perhaps,  in  addition  to  sitting  still  I  ought  to  have  put 
on  my  hat. 

"  Dr.  Seip  from  Alexandria,  Red  River,  came  down  this  evening. 
He  is  looking  well  and  in  good  spirits,  poor  fellow,  having   made   a 


WM.  W.  IN  NEW  ORLEANS,  AND  H.  A.  W.  IN  NEW  YORK.  1 59 

large  crop  of  cotton  and  also  a  very  large  one  of  corn,  and  he  finds 
that  some  sugarcane  that  he  planted  as  an  experiment  is  going  to 
do  well.  You  recollect  I  visited  him  last  April.  He  says  he  thinks 
the  luck  has  turned  with  him.  Good-night,  dearest  ;  God  bless  you 
and  my  dear  children. 

"January  7,  1846.  Your  long  and  most  deeply  interesting  letter 
of  December  19  only  arrived  this  evening.  It  had  been  sent,  along 
with  many  business  letters,  to  Columbus.  It  was  marked  No.  4, 
but  is  the  second  No.  4  I  have  received.  You  had  better  mark  the 
number  of  each  letter  in  your  account  book  as  you  send  them  off. 
The  No.  4  received  to-day  gave  me  an  account  of  your  going  with 
the  Rowlands  to  Dr.  Hutton's  church,  and  how  much  you  and  Sam 
Hovvland  were  affected.  I  think  he  must  be  a  fine  fellow,  and  I 
should  like  to  know  him  better. 

"  Tell  my  dear  little  round-faced  Bessie  that  I  am  glad  to  hear 
she  behaved  so  well  about  her  tooth-drawing.  What  is  my  little 
Harriet  doing  ?     You  have  not  told  me  anything  especial  about  her. 

"  It  is  now  11.30  p.  M.,  and  I  have  just  returned  from  a  magnifi- 
cent dinner  party  at  Helen  Nicholson's.  I  must  say  I  never  saw 
anything  in  better  taste.  I  will  go  further  and  say  I  never  saw  any- 
thing in  such  good  taste.  Furniture,  plate,  crystal,  chandeliers, 
lamps,  tables,  tablecloths,  screens,  each  and  all  the  most  beautiful 
of  their  kind,  and  all  in  excellent  keeping  ;  nothing  gaudy,  but  all 
truly  elegant  ;  and  if,  as  Di.  Chalmers  said,  '  angels  themselves  look 
down  with  pleasure  upon  a  party  of  friends  assembled  round  a  con- 
vivial table,'  the  angels  this  evening  must  have  had  a  hilarious  time 
of  it.  But  I  just  thought  I  would  not  give  my  little  imp  of  a  Helen 
for  it  all,  to  say  nothing  of  Willie  and  the  four  larger  jewels  of  our 
coronet.  The  party  consisted  of  our  noble  self,  who  led  in  the  lady 
of  the  house  and  sat  on  her  left  hand  ;  Captain  Elliot,  R.  N.,  who 
was  our  minister  in  China  and  Texas — a  very  pleasant  man,  but  one 
who  talks  too  much  for  a  diplomat  ;  he  says  that  he  has  traveled 
so  much  that  he  believes  that,  if  all  his  journeys  were  added  up, 
they  would  go  forty  times  round  the  world  ;  then  there  were 
Grymes,  the  great  lawyer,  Thomas  Slidell,  Ward,  Ledoux,  Briggs, 
Berger,  and  sundry  other  coats  and  waistcoats,  making,  with  the 
lord  and  lady,  fourteen. 

"  January   8,    1846.     This    day   last  year   we    all    arrived    here 


l6o  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

after  our  long  voyage.  The  weather  to-day  is  beautiful,  clear  and 
bright.  So  far  the  weather  has  been  cooler  than  last  year,  but 
very  pleasant.  The  troops  are  all  out,  and  sundry  processions,  etc., 
are  to  take  place  at  noon. 

"  God  forever  bless  and  watch  over  you  and  my  dear  children. 
"  Ever  thine  own  attached 

"  Wm.  W. 
"  P.  S. — Mr.  Pelton  has  written  begging  me  to  select  a  hogshead  of 
sugar  for  you,  the  best  of  his  crop  ;  this  is  very  kind,  but  very  funny. 
Of  course  I  declined  with  thanks. 

"Wm.  W." 

"  New  York,  January  6,  1846. 
"  My  Beloved  and  Deluded   Old  Husband  : 

"  Yours  of  December  28,  from  Alabama  River  to  Mobile,  has 
arrived  ;  it  reached  me  last  evening.  But  before  I  write  further  let 
me  tell  you  that  dear  John  Walter  is  safely  home,  and  perfectly  well, 
for  I  fear  Tom  Kane  in  his  anxiety  to  save  you  uneasiness  must 
have  given  you  a  great  deal.  He  writes  me  that  he  sent  on  a  letter 
to  you  on  New  Year's  Day  to  save  time,  fearing  that  I  had  written 
to  you  that  J.  Walter  had  the  smallpox,  and  to  say  that  it  was  not 
smallpox  after  all,  but,  owing  to  the  caution  of  Maria  and  Mr.  De 
Peyster,  and  the  Kanes  writing  daily  to  them,  and  not  to  me,  / 
never  knew  that  they  had  feared  smallpox  for  him  until  he  was 
entirely  well.  It  seems  that  the  whole  city  has  been  groaning  under 
that  awful  scourge,  and  poor  J.  W.  must  have  had  measles  before  he 
left  home.  Their  old  humbug  of  a  doctor  pronounced  it  smallpox  ; 
a  sign,  '  Smallpox,'  was  put  up  on  the  street  door,  and  nobody 
came  near  the  house  for  six  days  ;  notes  were  thrust  in  under  the 
door  inquiring  for  J.  W.;  and  the  neighbors'  children  on  both 
sides  of  the  way  were  packed  off  to  the  country  together  with  the 
young  of  Mrs.  Kane's  family  to  escape  infection.  Mrs.  Kane  re- 
mained in  town  and  wanted  to  come  in  to  nurse  him,  but  her  hus- 
band and  the  boys  would  not  let  her.  An  old  smallpox  nurse  was 
sent  by  the  doctor  to  attend  him,  but  Tom  would  not  let  her  come 
near  him,  but  nursed  J.  W.  himself  day  and  night  like  a  most  faith- 
ful nurse  and  brother — made  up  his  bed  for  him  daily,  brought  him 
his  medicines  and  drinks,  and  lent  him  his  own  new  dressing  gown, — 


WM.  W.  IN   NEW    ORLEANS,  AND    H.  A.  W.  IN   NEW  YORK.    l6l 

in  fact,  insisted  upon  his  accepting  it  as  a  present, — a  new  one  only 
given  to  Tom  on  Christmas  Day,  but  J.  Walter  gave  it  to  the  servant 
to  give  to  Tom,  together  with  a  dollar  to  cover  some  little  omnibus 
hires,  etc.,  which  he  could  not  find  opportunity  to  pay  ;  he  did  this 
in  presence  of  some  of  the  younger  children,  so  Tom  would  be  sure 
to  get  it.  Tom  slept  in  the  next  room  to  him  with  a  string  round  his 
wrist  fastened  to  J.  W.'s  bedpost  to  awaken  him  at  night,  and  he 
read  the  Bible  to  him  daily.  His  journey  cost  him  $16.75  !  I  gave 
him  $17.  The  doctor  paid  him  three  visits,  which  Mrs.  Kane  would 
not  let  him  pay  for,  saying  that  Dr.  H.  had  sent  in  no  account,  and 
she  was  sure  he  would  not,  but  if  he  did,  she  would  promise  to  send 
it  on  to  me.  But  to-night  I  wrote  to  her  telling  her  of  J.  W.'s  safe 
arrival,  and  inclosing  her  ten  dollars,  which  I  begged  her  to  send  from 
us  to  Dr.  Harris,  or  settle  his  account  if  he  sent  one.  She  said  his 
general  charge  was  two  dollars.  Did  I  do  right  ?  Well,  dear  J. 
Walter  looks  thinner,  but  quite  well  ;  says  he  has  enjoyed  his  visit, 
and  seen  many  persons,  institutions,  and  other  lions  in  spite  of  his 
illness,  but  from  Monday  night  till  Friday  morning  he  never  saw 
the  light.  He  is  in  good  spirits  and  has  a  good  appetite,  and  so 
perhaps  it  is  better  after  all  he  was  ill  away  from  home,  as  the 
others  have  kept  well,  and  we  are  now  rid  of  the  smoke,  which  latter 
nuisance  was  very  much  increased  by  the  introduction  of  a  new 
stovepipe  into  our  chimney  from  the  entry  stove.  I  had  a  fire  to 
try  the  chimney  lighted  in  our  bedroom  to-day,  and  it  did  very  well. 
The  chimney  has  been  swept.  Captain  Comstock  has  made  grand 
baths  in  the  house  in  the  second  and  third  stories,  both  hot  and 
cold.  The  bath  rooms  are  all  nicely  carpeted,  with  soap,  towels, 
looking-glass,  etc.,  and  ready  at  all  hours.  Monnot  goes  February  i, 
but  has  no  say  in  the  house  any  more,  has  to  do  as  he  is  bidden,  and 
Captain  Comstock  is  the  only  and  sole  master.  I  sent  for  Whit- 
man yesterday  and  said  I  would  settle  his  bill  as  soon  as  it  was 
rectified,  but  that  my  son  had  been  absent  ten  days,  and  the  whole 
of  his  board  was  charged.  He  then  took  off  fifteen  dollars,  or  a 
dollar  and  a  half  a  day. 

"  Now  for  my  poor  old  deluded  husband,  who  has  let  the  devil 
persuade  him  that  his  duty  lies  in  remaining  in  this  country  for  the 
paltry  advantage  of  good  schools  for  the  children,  and  leaving  me 
near  my  sisters,  and  that  he  is  in  duty  bound  to  make  the  sacrifice 


l62  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

of  leaving  his  wife  and  family  nearly  one-half  of  every  year,  to  fight 
as  they  can  for  themselves,  for  comfort,  happiness,  advice,  and 
counsel.  God  help  them  while  you  go  and  amass  a  little  more  of 
this  world's  treasure  for  them  !  No,  William,  that  is  not  your  duty  ; 
a  father's  presence  is  necessary  for  his  children — if  you  do  without 
them,  they  will  soon  learn  to  do  without  _>w/y  the  mother  is  not  to  be 
the  only  guardian  of  their  minds  and  bodies — the  father,  too,  is  to 
bring  them  up  '  in  the  nurture  and  admonition  of  the  Lord,'  '  to 
talk  with  them  by  the  way  '  (not  write  to  them),  '  when  thou  liest 
down  and  when  thou  risest  up.'  And  the  husband  is  to  *  cleave 
unto  the  wife  ' — pretty  cleaving  I  would  call  such  conduct  as  that. 
You  are  given  me  by  God  as  a  helpmeet,  and  in  the  hour  of  trial,  of 
sickness  and  suffering,  for  myself  or  children,  where  are  you  ? 
Where  is  my  adviser,  my  friend,  my  counselor  ?  God  is  there,  it  is 
true,  but  he  has  given  you  to  me,  and  me  to  you,  as  fellow-helpers 
of  each  other,  and  we  are  wrong  to  let  the  prospect  of  any  worldly 
advantage  separate  us.  The  husband  is  to  nourish  and  cherish  the 
wife  :  can  he  do  that  two  or  three  thousand  miles  away  ?  No,  my 
precious  husband,  it  is  not  even  for  our  worldly  good  to  be  separated. 
What  worldly  good  is  greater  than  each  other's  society  .''  At  least  / 
can  answer  for  myself;  nothing  could  compensate  me  for  the  loss  of 
your  society.  I  sometimes  feel  now  that  I  can  hardly  bear  three 
days  more  of  absence,  and  three  months  make  me  feel  sickening 
of  heart  I  cannot  describe  to  you,  and  I  give  a  sort  of  stifled  sigh 
and  an  incredulous  stare  into  the  fire  as  I  muse  upon  the  horrid 
probability. 

"  Dr.  Hutton  called  here  to-day,  but  I  was  out,  which  I  much  re- 
gretted ;  also  Mrs.  Van  Rensselaer  and  Philip  Van  R. ;  also  Mrs. 
Edward  J.  Jones  and  Elizabeth  Jones,  and  Mrs.  Hamilton  Wilkes. 

"  Dear  Helen  says  :  '  Papa  far  away,'  and  asks  visitors  :  'Are  you 
weel?'  Willie  has  had  an  old  pocketbook  given  to  him  and  two 
cents  in  it  by  Charlotte.  He  said  to  me  :  '  I've  now  got  enough  for 
two  Sundays  ;  I'm  so  glad.'  I  said  :  'How  for  two  Sundays — what 
do  you  mean  ? '  '  Why,'  said  he,  '  don't  you  know  the  poor  ?  '  He 
is  a  very  good  boy  at  his  lessons,  and,  indeed,  at  everything  else.  He 
said  to  me  yesterday,  when  I  was  reading  my  Bible  to  myself:  '  Is 
that  about  Joshua  you  are  reading,  mamma — Joshua  smiting  Ai  ? ' 

"  Bessie  received  your  'Athenian  Orators  '  and  was  much  pleased. 


WM.  W.  IN  NEW  ORLEANS,  AND  H.  A.  W.  IN  NEW  YORK.  1 63 

She  gets  Samuel,  the  waiter,  to  bring  her  the  paper  every  night.  I 
will  not  cross  my  letter,  though  I  could  write  on  all  night.  God 
bless  you,  my  own  darling  Will.  Don't  deceive  yourself  and  think 
it  is  your  duty  to  stay  longer  than  the  beginning  of  March  in  New 
Orleans.  I  have  counted  125  days  to  March  i,  of  which  only  41 
are  marked  off.  I  shall  write  to  you  on  Wednesday  after  this  and 
the  children  on  Saturday,  so  you  will  get  two  letters  every  week 
and  not  at  the  same  time. 

"  Ever  your  own  fond  **  H." 

'*  January  7.     All  well." 

''  New  York,  January  10,  1846. 
"My  Beloved  Husband  : 

"  Though  I  had  fully  intended  J.  W.'s  letter  should  go  alone,  that 
you  might  get  our  letters  separately,  yet  I  cannot  resist  the  tempta- 
tion of  inclosing  his  letter  in  half  a  sheet,  as  you  say  it  is  all  one  post- 
age. I  wrote  you  last  on  Wednesday  or  Thursday.  Since  then  I 
have  received  yours  of  December  30  from  Mobile,  and  those  of  De- 
cember 31  and  January  i  from  New  Orleans  reached  me  last  night. 
God  bless  you,  darling,  for  all  your  kindness  and  devotion  to  me, 
and  what  shall  we  render  unto  him  for  all  his  benefits  toward  us  in 
bringing  you  in  so  much  mercy  to  your  journey's  end  ? 

"  Poor  Mary  Brown,  I  feel  much  for  her,  and  fear  she  has  discov- 
ered too  late  her  unfortunate  marriage.  You  will,  of  course,  reply 
to  the  letter  from  her  sister. 

"  I  wish  you  would  tell  me,  or  hint  to  me,  in  your  answer  to  this 
when  you  think  it  likely  you  may  return,  for  I  count  the  days,  and 
have  counted  that  to  March  i  from  November  27  was  125  days  ;  of 
this  45  are  done  this  day  [My  dearest  must  have  meant  till  April  i, 
really  124  days.  \V.  W.].  Do  tell  me  what  I  may  hope  and  what  I 
may  expect. 

"  I  began  the  Gospel  of  John  and  ist  Psalm  with  you.  The  Psalms 
I  read  in  the  evening,  but  as  I  want  to  finish  my  Bible  before  April, 
I  have  not  begun  Luke  with  you,  but  go  regularly  on  with  Acts. 
The  Psalm  for  this  evening  is  the  44th.  Does  this  agree  with  your 
reading  ? 

"  I  saw  Mrs.  Edward  Ogden  yesterday.  She  tells  me  the  frost  has 
been  severe  at  New  Orleans.     We  have  had  some  days  of  what  they 


164  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

call  remarkably  cold  weather,  but  neither  I  nor  the  children  nor 
Powell  felt  it  so  ;  in  fact,  we  have  all  remarked  that  we  felt  the  cold 
less  than  we  did  in  England.  Not  a  chilblain  has  been  felt  by  any 
of  us  ;  even  Bessie  is  quite' free.  By  the  way,  Bess  is  delighted  with 
the  '  Life  of  Warren  Hastings.'  Ever  since  before  Christmas  the 
weather  has  been  delightful,  like  fine  autumn  weather.  My  wadded 
spencer,  which  I  had  made  to  wear  under  my  cloak,  has  never  been 
needed,  nor  my  woolen  gloves.  These  I  always  wore  on  cold  days 
in  England. 

"  Dr.  Bethune  preaches  for  Dr.  Hutton  to-morrow.  Dr.  Hutton 
is  in  Philadelphia.  Maria  and  Mr.  De  Peyster  and  Margaret  Hone 
are  going  to  hear  Dr.  Bethune.  The  subject  is  '  Using  the  World 
Without  Abusing  It.' 

"  I  am  very  glad  you  gave  Sellar  the  Bible.  May  God  in  his 
mercy  bless  the  gift  to  his  eternal  salvation  ! 

"We  are  all  going  to  dine  at  Maria's  to-day,  but  first  I  am  going 
to  take  poor  Bess  to  get  two  back  teeth  out.  Did  I  tell  you  Jane 
Hone  took  her  to  have  one  out  before,  and  I  took  her  two  weeks  ago, 
when  she  and  Charlotte  had  each  one  out,  and  behaved  nobly,  Bess 
as  well  as  Charlotte  ? 

"  There  are  no  letters  yet  to  send  to  you  from  Mary  or  Anna,  but 
I  will  do  so  when  they  arrive.  Shall  I  send  on  to  you  Mr.  B.'s 
papers  and  the  British  Quarterly,  and  how  ?  I  have  read  a  great 
many  of  these,  and  have  also  read  the  Revietvs  you  left  me.  I  am 
now  finishing  'The  Crescent  and  the  Cross,'  which  I  don't  like  at  all, 
and  cannot  get  on  with.  My  money  goes  so  fast  that  I  feel  too  stingy 
to  buy  Arnold's  '  Sermons,'  but  would  like  them  very  much,  and  per- 
haps I  may  get  them,  after  all. 

"  I  dined  at  Uncle  Phil's  on  Thursday,  and  had  a  very  pleasant 
time.  I  am  invited  to  a  large  ball  at  Wm.  Douglas',  and  to  several 
smaller  outings.  Mary  Van  Rensselaer  called  here  with  her  husband  ; 
also  Mrs.  Gov.  Bibby,  Dr.  Hutton,  Mrs.  Edward  Jones,  Mrs.  Robin- 
son, and  Mrs.  Livingstone  (Miss  Julia  Boggs  that  was);  also  Mrs. 
Hamilton  Wilkes. 

"  Willie  said  to  me  last  night :  '  Mamma,  do  you  love  your  wife  ? ' 
I  said  :  '  I  have  no  wife,  my  dear  ;  I  am  a  wife  myself.'  '  Oh  !  '  says 
he,  'because  the  Bible  says  he  that  loves  his  wife  loves  himself,  for  I 
heard  you  read  so  the  other  morning.'     Don't  you  think  this  shows 


WM.  VV.  IN   NEW   ORLEANS,  AND   H.  A.  W.  IN   NEW   YORK.    165 

that  he  listens  to  some  purpose  ?  I  told  you  about  his  asking  if  I 
were  reading  about  Joshua  smiting  Ai.  He  said  to  me  afterward 
that  the  reason  he  asked  was  because  he  saw  a  large  A  at  the  top  of 
the  chapter. 

"  God  bless  you,  my  dearest,  dearest  W.  I  thought  a  great  deal  of 
you  all  Sunday,  thinking  you  would  ptobably  hear  Mr.  Scott  on  that 
day,  and  perhaps  take  the  Lord's  Supper,  as  it  was  the  first  Sun- 
day in  the  month.  Willie,  Bessie,  Charlotte,  and  Harrie  send  you 
much  love,  and  dear  Helen  has  just  been  putting  up  her  little 
mouth  to  kiss  me,  with  her  eye  upon  the  paper  to  see  if  I  sent 
the  kiss  to  dear  papa.     Remember  me  to  Sellar  and  Murray. 

"  Thine  own  "  H." 

"  50  Chartres  Street,  New  Orleans, 

"Sunday,  January  11,  1846. 
"  My  Darling  Wife  : 

"Your  welcome  letter  of  ist  and  2d  inst.  reached  me  this  after- 
noon. 

"  My  dear,  blessed  John  Walter  !  I  hope  God  has  restored  him 
to  health,  and  sent  him  back  to  you  in  safety.  How  you  must 
have  felt,  you  dear  one,  when  your  husband  was  away,  your  eldest 
hope  ill  in  Philadelphia,  and,  to  crown  all,  your  two  chimneys  smok- 
ing like  steamboats  !  It  is  odd  that  no  one  thought  sooner  of  the 
simple  remedy  of  having  them  swept.  Now  that  they  are  in  a  state 
of  convalescence  I  hope  you  will  stay  still  in  the  rooms  I  left  you 
in,  lest  you  should  go  further  and  fare  worse.  Your  ground-story 
rooms  are  very  convenient  and  safe  in  case  of  fire. 

"  But  now  let  me  proceed  in  a  regular  course  since  my  last,  which 
I  closed  on  the  morning  of  8th  inst.  Afterward  I  went  and  saw  the 
troops  march  along  Royal  Street,  and  then  to  the  '  Place  d'Armes,' 
where  the  cannon  were  fired  in  commemoration  of  the  glorious 
8th  and  General  Jackson, 

'  Whom  the  British  turned  their  backs  on,' 

after  which  I  walked  about  two  and  a  half  miles  down  the  Shell  Road 
by  myself,  and  returned  just  in  time  to  dress  for  dinner.  Dr.  Seip 
dining  with   us.     On   changing   my  coat  I  found  my  keys  were  not 


l66  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

there,  but  supposed  I  had  left  them  in  the  office,  which  was  rather  a 
bore,  but  I  did  not  bother  myself  about  it.  Next  morning,  however, 
on  resuming  my  frock  coat  I  found  there  was  a  hole  in  the  bottom 
of  the  breast  pocket,  where  I  keep  my  keys,  and  the  thought  imme- 
diately flashed  through  my  mind  that  through  it  my  five  keys,  watch 
key,  and  steel  ring  had  dropped.  I  still,  however,  buoyed  myself  up 
with  the  hope  that  they  might  be  in  the  office,  but  it  was  hoping 
against  hope.  On  reaching  it  after  breakfast  I  found  that  they  were 
not  there,  so  I  immediately  put  an  advertisement  in  the  Picayune 
and  Courier,  but  so  far  they  have  not  been  found.  I  had  my  desk 
lock  in  the  office  picked,  and  a  new  key  made,  but  I  am  loath  to 
commence  operations  on  my  portmanteau,  carpetbag,' hatbox,  and 
writing  case,  the  first  and  last  being  patent  locks,  until  a  week  has 
elapsed  without  the  keys  being  found.  Meanwhile,  I  am  deprived  of 
my  journal,  and  of  writing  a  bit  to  you  every  evening  after  the  work 
of  the  day,  which  is  my  usual  solace,  as  I  have  no  lock-fast  place  to 
secrete  my  lucubrations,  and  my  journal  is  patent  locked  in  my  port- 
manteau, and  altogether  I  am  '  in  a  fix.'  I  don't  believe  I  shall  ever 
get  the  keys,  as  my  belief  is  they  have  dropped  among  the  weeds 
at  the  edge  of  the  canal,  as  I  twice  or  three  times  jumped  over 
the  fence  to  get  what  I  thought  were  alligator's  eggs  lying  at  the 
edge  of  the  water,  but  which  I  believe  were  only  hen's  eggs  'faded,' 
as  Lawrence  Heyworth  would  say. 

"  Friday,  9th.     I  was  busy  all  day,  and  so  was  I  yesterday. 

"  Saturday,  loth.  After  leaving  the  office  I  go  to  a  very  mild 
newsroom,  and  read  all  the  New  York  papers  ;  then  come  home 
and  read  '  Eothen  '  till  about  ten,  when  Murray  and  Mylne  come 
home  from  the  club. 

"  I  rise  about  seven,  and  after  dressing,  read  my  Bible  and  Jay  ; 
(and,  by  the  by,  dear  Bessie's  bookmark  has  just  come  when  it  was 
wanted,  as,  besides  reading  Luke  and  the  Psalms,  I  am  going  through 
Judges  ;  thank  the  dear,  round  face  for  her  gift).  By  the  way,  you 
mention  all  the  children  but  that  dear,  little  cunning  girl  Harrie  I 
think  they  call  her  ;  do  kiss  her  little  skate  mouth  for  me,  and  tell  me 
all  about  her,  how  she  is  getting  on  with  her  lessons. 

This  morning  a  stranger  preached  for  Dr.  Scott.  Just  before  the 
sermon  one  of  the  elders,  a  man  with  very  black  hair,  or  a  very  black 
wig,  and  a  very  yellow  face,  a  Mr.  Maybin,  I  rather  think,  stepped  in 


WM.  W.  IN   NEW   ORLEANS,  AND   H.  A.  W.  IN   NEW   YORK.    167 

front  of  the  pulpit,  and,  addressing  the  congregation,  said  that  yester- 
day at  Baton  Rouge  Dr.  Scott  had  been  acquitted  by  the  Presbytery 
of  Louisiana  of  all  the  charges  brought  against  him.  These  charges 
were  four,  arising  out  of  something  he  had  said  about  Henry  Clay 
playing  cards  on  Sunday.  On  the  first  and  third  he  was  acquitted 
unanimously,  on  the  second  and  fourth  he  was  found  not  guilty  by 
sixteen  out  of  seventeen.  Of  course  on  these  two  charges  one  of  the 
presbytery  voted  him  guilty,  and  this  one  was  the  same  in  both 
charges,  a  Mr.  Smyth.  According  to  the  nomenclature  adopted  by 
religious  people  in  'these  diggin's,'  Mr.  Maybin  called  him  Father 
Smyth,  which  is  clean  contrary  to  the  Scripture  command,  inasmuch 
as  I  think  the  Bible  tells  us  expressly  to  call  no  man  father  (in  a 
religious  sense)  upon  earth  ;  nevertheless,  we  are  to  treat  the  elder 
men  as  fathers,  and  the  younger  women  as  sisters  with  all  purity. 
These  younger  women  are  ticklish  jobs,  and  occasionally  sore  trials  to 
weak  brethren,  and  my  advice  is  not  to  treat  them  at  all,  but  to  keep 
clear  of  them,  unless  they  be  particularly  ugly.  After  forenoon 
church;(by  the  way,  Mrs.  Tom  Slidell  was  there)  I  walked  away  by 
myself  down  the  Shell  Road  about  three  and  a  half  miles  to  the 
M^tairie  race  course  ;  there  I  crossed  the  canal  by  a  bridge  and 
went  along  a  country  road  about  two  miles,  which  took  me  to  the 
Bayou  St.  John,  along  which  I  walked  some  two  and  a  half  miles 
until  I  reached  town.  The  day  was  cold  and  clear  as  crystal,  with  a 
bright  sun  and  fine  breeze,  and  I  enjoyed  my  walk  very  much,  think- 
ing of  each  and  all  of  you,  and  a  great  deal  about  my  dear  John 
Walter,  and  how  if  he  were  spared  he  would  shortly  be  quite  a  com- 
panion for  me.  I  was  also  arguing  the  pros  and  cons  about  going 
home  or  staying  on  this  side,  if  we  were  spared,  at  any  rate  for 
another  year.  If  I  did  that,  I  would  need  to  leave  you  again  in  July 
for  three  months,  and  so  I  could  not  make  up  my  mind  on  the  sub- 
ject, and  prayed  that  God  would  direct  our  lives  to  fall  in  pleasant 
places,  and  give  us  a  goodly  heritage  as  regarded  spiritual  matters, 
and,  as  regarded  temporal  matters,  that  he  would  decide  for  us  as  he 
might  see  most  fit. 

"  When  I  arrived  at  home,  I  got  your  letter,  and  was  much  alarmed 
about  dear  John  Walter,  and  should  have  felt  exceedingly  anxious  if 
you  had  not  said  Tom  Kane  as  well  as  he  himself  wrote  that  he 
was  better.     It  is  a  lesson  to  me  never  to  let  children  leave  home 


l68  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

on  a  visit  until  they  have  at  least  had  all  the  children's  com- 
plaints. I  don't  know  how  we  are  ever  to  repay  Tom  Kane's  kind- 
ness to  J.  Walter,  and  all  the  Kane  family  for  the  trouble  he  must 
have  caused  them.  I  have  not  written  to  Tom  since  I  came  here, 
but  as  soon  as  I  hear  that  my  dear  boy  is  safe  home,  as  I  trust  in 
God  I  shall  hear  soon,  I  will  write  and  thank  him.  I  wish  you 
could  write  and  ask  Bessie  Kane  to  come  and  pay  Charlotte  a  visit. 
If  J.  Walter  were  perfectly  well  and  could  get  a  room  upstairs,  she 
might  occupy  his.  However,  I  need  not  bother  you  about  this,  as  I 
suppose  she  would  not  come,  and  I  presume  you  would  not  like  to 
increase  your  charge  when  I  am  away. 

"  I  have  just  come  back  from  Dr.  Scott's.  It  is  a  fine  moonlight 
night,  yi^//  moon,  clear  and  cold.  The  sermon  was  pretty  good,  but 
I  was  bothered  about  J.  Walter  ;  the  prayers  were  good,  and  so  were 
the  hymns.  I  feel  also  troubled  about  you  and  the  children.  I 
fear  their  getting  ill,  and  for  you  if  they  should  do  so.  You  say 
Powell  is  nearly  well  ;  I  did  not  know  she  had  been  ill.  I  wish  you 
would  thank  Mr.  De  Peyster  and  Maria  for  me  for  their  great  kind- 
ness to  you,  and  give  them  my  love,  and  I  wish  you  would  also  take 
an  opportunity  of  expressing  my  thanks  to  Uncle  Philip,  John  Hone, 
and  Sam  Howland.  It  really  is  not  right  for  the  father  of  a  family 
to  be  away  ;  however,  necessity  has  no  law  ;  but  I  suspect  if  we  once 
get  together  again  we  must  just  keep  together,  business  or  no  busi- 
ness ;  but  it  will  be  a  desperate  pull  for  you  leaving  your  sisters  and 
friends  and  this  country.  But  if  we  were  to  stay  it  would  be  abso- 
lutely necessary  for  me  to  go  over  this  summer  if  I  live. 

"  God  bless  our  dear  ones — they're  fine  children,  all  the  six, 
and  I  love  them  dearly  ;  may  he  unite  us  all  in  health  and  happiness 
if  it  be  his  blessed  will.     Good-night. 

"Monday,  January  12,  1846.  The  mail  has  failed  from  beyond 
Charleston,  so  I  shall  have  to  wait  at  least  another  day  before  I  can 
hear  of  my  dear  Johnnie.  The  weather  here  is  very  frosty,  but 
warm  in  the  sun — splendid  winter  weather,  but  much  colder  than  I 
could  have  anticipated  in  New  Orleans.  Tell  J.  Walter  that  Mr, 
Poore  is  here  at  present,  and  is  to  dine  with  us  to-morrow.  I  do  not 
recollect  of  any  more  news  to  tell  you.  I  have  some  thoughts  of 
going  to  a  missionary  meeting  this  evening  at  Dr.  Scott's.  I  wish 
you  would  be  on  the  outlook  for  a  nurse  who  would  be  willing,   if 


WM.  W.  IN   NEW   ORLEANS,  AND    H.  A.  W.  IN   NEW   YORK.    169 

required,  to  accompany  us  to  England.  God  bless  and  watch 
over  you  and  my  dear  children,  and  grant  that  I  may  receive  good 
news  of  you  all  by  the  next  letters. 

"  Ever  thine  own  attached  husband, 

"  Wm.  W." 

"  New  York,  January  13,  1846. 
"  My  Dear,  Dear  Will  : 

"  I  have  just  received  your  precious  letter  of  4th  and  5th  inst. 
Oh  !  how  grieved  I  am  that  you  should  not  have  received  any  but 
my  first  four  letters.  Had  it  not  been  for  your  tenderness  and  faith- 
fulness in  writing  to  me  so  often  and  receiving  your  letters  regularly, 
I  could  not  have  borne  your  absence  ;  andjv^?^,  dear  fellow,  to  suffer 
from  hope  deferred  after  reaching  New  Orleans  !  I  write  to  you 
now  just  a  little  bit  to  express  the  feelings  that  are  crowding  upon 
me,  but  will  wait  till  Wednesday  before  I  send  this  off.  I  have 
hitherto  only  written  to  you  once  a  week,  because  you  desired  me 
before  starting  to  write  only  once.  The  children  were  to  write 
alternately  every  Saturday,  which  they  have  done  with  the  one 
exception  when  J.  W.  was  away,  and  I  was  to  write  in  the  middle  of 
the  week,  so  that  you  could  hear  from  us  thrice,  but  in  future  I  will 
always  write  a  half  sheet  on  Saturday,  inclosing  the  children's  let- 
ter, or,  if  you  wish  it,  write  to  you  on  Sunday  and  Wednesday,  and 
let  the  children's  go  off  alone  on  Saturday,  making  three  times  a 
week,  for  I  could  write  to  you  for  my  own  pleasure  ^z;^;^  ^^yy  so 
you  have  only  to  command.  Your  letters,  I  think,  have  all  reached 
me  regularly  ;  this  evening  I  have  No.  22.  Did  you  get  my  letter 
saying  we  were  thinking  of  you  on  Sunday,  4th  inst.,  of  your 
being  at  Dr.  Scott's  church,  and  taking  the  Lord's  Supper  ? 

"  With  regard  to  what  you  say  about  remaining  in  this  country 
for  another  year,  I  really  could  not  stand  it,  if  it  involved  the  neces- 
sity of  another  separation  from  you.  If  it  were  thought  for  the 
good  of  the  business  that  you  should  remain  in  New  York  alto- 
gether, I  might  bring  my  mind  to  parting  with  you  once,  but  not  so 
soon  as  July,  and  after  that  to  remain  permanently  in  this  country. 
No  earthly  inducemetit,  hoivever  great,  could  make  me  give  a  willing 
consent  to  be  separated  from  you  for  two  or  three  months  every 
ytzx,  or  every  other  year.     But,  darling,  '  all  our  times  are  in  God's 


I/O  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

hands.'  Let  us  in  all  our  ways  acknowledge  him,  and  '  he  shall 
direct  our  paths.'  Let  us  not  '  lean  to  our  own  understanding,'  but, 
mistrusting  our  own  hearts,  pray  that  we  may  be  led,  step  by  step, 
as  may  be  best  for  our  spiritual  welfare,  clearly  understanding  what 
the  will  of  the  Lord  is,  and  not  desiring  worldly  companions  or 
worldly  good  for  our  children,  but  that  they  may  be  kept  from  the 
evil  of  the  world  and  the  pride  of  life.  But,  if  it  be  consistent  with 
their  eternal  welfare,  we  may  ask  that  the  'lines  may  fall  to  them  in 
pleasant  places,'  where  they  may  have  cheerfulness  and  content- 
ment, which  is  as  'marrow  to  the  bones.'  I  am  praying  daily  for 
you,  darling,  that  in  all  difficult  and  doubtful  matters  of  business 
God  will  give  you  wisdom  and  direct  you,  and  that  you  may  be  kept 
from  speculation  and  from  hasting  to  be  rich,  and  also  from  any 
unpleasantness  with  your  partners,  etc. 

"  To-day  I  purchased  Mrs.  Graham's  '  Life  '  for  Margaret  Hone, 
who  has  never  read  it,  and  also  a  copy  for  Anna  Winthrop,  one  dol- 
lar each.  I  am  very  glad  you  purchased  the  Bible  for  Sellar.  May 
God  give  him  the  spirit  of  understanding.  But  I  must  stop  now, 
or  I  shall  fill  up  my  letter  before  Wednesday. 

"  On  Thursday  I  go  to  a  party  at  the  Mills', — all  the  family,  the 
Bedells,  and  a  few  others  ;  J.  W.  and  Charlotte  go  also, — and  on 
Friday  to  a  party  at  Maria's,  to  meet  Mrs.  Golden,  Mrs.  Ashurst, 
Mary  Van  Rensselaer,  the  Hone  family,  and  other  intimate  friends. 
I  have  bought  a  pretty  ribbon,  headdress,  and  a  new  chemisette 
and  white  gloves  for  the  occasion.  J.  W.  will  come  for  me, 
but  is  only  to  come  in  about  nine  o'clock.  Charlotte  is  not 
asked.  But  the  week  after  Maria  is  to  give  a  party  in  her  name,  a 
large  child's  party,  and  all  the  nice  little  girls  that  Maria  knows  in 
town  are  to  be  asked.  They  are  to  have  a  supper,  a  man  to  play 
on  the  piano,  and  dancing. 

"  Good-night,  good-night. 

"All  your  letters  have  come  safe  to  hand,  but  No.  20  should  have 
been  numbered  19,  and  so  on.  I  got  No.  18  from  Mobile  on 
December  30,  written  just  before  you  started  for  New  Orleans,  and 
then  came  No.  20  of  December  31  at  New  Orleans,  and  No.  21, 
written  on  New  Year's  Day,  so  they  must  have  all  come  direct,  only 
there  was  this  mistake  in  the  numbering.  Poor  Charles  Brugiere 
and  Mrs.   Dawson  (Sarah   Jay,  my  old   schoolmate)  both   died  on 


WM.  W.  IN  NEW  ORLEANS,  AND  H.  A.  W.  IN  NEW  YORK.  I /I 

Friday  last,  and  were  both  buried  on  Sunday.  Charles  was  wasted 
to  a  skeleton,  and  she  had  been  propped  up  with  porter  and  wine, 
which  someone  had  advised  her  to  discontinue  and  try  the  water 
cure.  She  did  so,  and  nothing  could  revive  her.  Her  system  ran 
down  immediately,  and  for  three  weeks  she  only  took  porter  mixed 
with  morphine,  and  slept  none. 

"  Our  Mr.  Dawson  has  been  ill  with  cold,  but  is  quite  well  again. 
Mr.  Bethune  preached  a  very  clever  sermon  for  us  on  Sunday,  but 
not  a  very  interesting  one,  and  he  looked  like  a  sleek  stuffed  pig  on 
his  hind  legs.     A  most  sensual  countenance. 

"January  15,  1846.  This  is  a  most  superb  day,  like  an  English 
autumn  one.  Maria  is  to  send  her  carriage  for  us  to  go  to  the  Mills' 
at  half  past  seven,  and  Bell  Perry  is  to  take  tea  with  Bess  and  Harrie 
in  our  absence.  Maria  goes  afterward  to  William  Douglas'  in  Park 
Place  to  take  Louisa  Selden.  Did  I  tell  you  old  Packard  is  dying, 
and  has  sent  for  Augusta  to  come  to  him  ?  She  sailed  last  week  for 
the  West  Indies. 

"  There  is  to  be  a  series  of  magnificent  parties  given  every  Thurs- 
day evening  in  January  at  William  Douglas',  to  which  we  also  have 
invitations.     Did  I  tell  you  ? 

"  My  writing  is  horribly  bad,  as  my  pens  are  all  used  up,  and  that 
horrible  pale,  scratchy  writing  is  with  a  steel  pen  that  tires  my  hand. 
Emily  Foster's  baby  increases  in  strength  and  beauty,  and  is  really  a 
fine  child.  She  and  Maria  begged  me  to  be  sure  and  give  you  a 
great  deal  of  affectionate  love.  The  latter  was  eloquent  in  your 
praises  this  morning,  and  Emily  listened  with  apparent  pleasure  and 
occasional  assent.  We  walked  out  together  this  morning  around 
Washington  Park,  through  Fifth  Avenue  to  Sixteenth  Street,  and 
into  Union  Square  to  her  house,  where  I  spent  the  morning  till  half 
past  two,  Willie  and  little  Emily  running  before  us  the  whole  way, 
and  gamboling  together  in  the  park.  Little  Helen  then  came  up  for 
little  Willie  about  half  past  twelve  to  take  him  home  to  dinner. 
Maria  and  Emily  called  for  me,  as  the  morning  was  so  fine. 

"  I  wish  you  would  give  my  love  to  Sellar,  and  thanks  for  his  note, 
and  tell  him  I  can  scarcely  regret  that  sentence  in  it  where  he  says 
you  think  to  detain  him  till  you  come  North  in  company,  for  it  gives 
me  some  little  straw  of  hope  to  catch  at  as  to  your  returning  sooner 
than  you  expected.     But  as  we  are  all  doing  well,  I  should  be  sorry 


172  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

to  urge  you  to  do  anything  against  your  better  judgment,  and  if  you 
think  there  is  a  necessity  for  your  remaining  till  he  comes,  I  suppose 
you  must  just  do  it.  In  the  latter  case  we  would  all,  from  John 
Walter  to  Helen,  be  glad  to  see  our  young  friend's  honest  face  as  soon 
as  possible.  I  inclose  a  note  of  dear  Charlotte's,  written  on  Christmas 
Eve,  which,  I  think,  it  will  give  you  pleasure  to  see,  both  the  hand- 
writing, sealing,  and  wording  are  so  good.  I  think  the  idea,  too,  of 
hiding  it  under  my  pillow,  where  I  might  find  it  as  soon  as  I  woke, 
was  a  good  one.  I  sat  up  in  bed  and  read  it  by  candle-light,  and 
then  examined  the  contents  of  my  stocking,  which  was  filled  with  con- 
tributions from  the  little  ones  according  to  their  means,  Charlotte 
and  Bessie  the  largest  contributors,  however. 

"Our  table  continues  to  be  nicely  supplied,  but  the  smoke  is  not 
quite  cured.  They  commence  building  the  upper  story  to  this  wing 
early  in  February,  so  I  hope  the  outside  dirt  will  be  taken  away 
before  we  open  our  windows,  and  the  inside  noise  will  be  over  before 
April. 

"  John  Walter  is  perfectly  well  again,  and  so  are  all  the  rest. 
Helen  is  getting  lovely  ;  she  is  as  fat  as  a  roll  of  butter,  and  has  a 
fine  fresh  color.  Powell  is  pretty  well,  but  liable  to  attacks  of 
slight  indisposition.  She  is,  however,  cheerful  and  faithful  in  her 
services.  She  was  much  gratified  at  your  remembering  her  in  your 
letter. 

"  God  bless  you,  my  beloved  William,  with  his  best  and  choicest 
blessings.  May  we  be  spared  to  meet  in  health  and  happiness  for 
Christ's  sake. 

"  Ever  thine  own  devoted  "  H." 


CHAPTER  X. 

CORRESPONDENCE    CONTINUED WINTER    OF    1846. 

"  New  Orleans,  January  14,  1846. 
"  My  Darling  Harriet  : 

"I  closed  may  last  to  you  on  12th  inst.,  and  have  received 
nothing  later  from  you  than  2d  inst.,  although  there  is  a  letter 
to  the  house  here  from  D.  &  Co.  of  5th  inst.  This  makes  me 
feel  anxious  about  ray  dear  John  Walter.  I  am  afraid  he  has 
grown  worse,  and  that  you  thought  you  would  wait  for  better  news 
before  writing  to  me.  I  have  looked  over  Mr.  Kane's  paper,  the 
Pennsylvanian,  till  6th  inst.,  and  as  I  see  no  notice  of  dear  Johnnie 
having  departed  this  life,  there  is  a  sort  of  negative  satisfaction  to 
me,  but  I  wish  you  had  just  let  me  know  how  he  is.  But  since  you 
have  not  done  so  don't  regret  it,  and  bother  yourself,  you  dear  one. 
When  you  get  this,  I  hope  I  may  have  had  good  news. 

"On  Monday  morning  last,  12th  inst.,  I  went  to  a  missionary 
meeting  at  Dr.  Scott's  church.  It  was  not  particularly  well  attended, 
but  was  very  much  in  the  style  of  those  in  England.  Dr.  Scott  gave 
out  the  missionary  hymn  :  '  From  Greenland's  icy  mountains,' 
which  was  beautifully  played  and  sung.  I  joined  heartily,  'singing 
and  making  melody  in  my  heart,'  if  not  much  with  my  voice,  but  I 
suspect  a  good  deal  of  my  fervor  was  from  '  we  call  it  memory  '  as 
much  as  from  devotion,  and  that  had  they  suddenly  changed  to  'Of 
a'  the  airts  the  wind  can  blaw,'  the  current  of  my  feelings 
would  not  have  been  very  rudely  checked. 

"  To-day  Dr.  Seip  has  been  buying  six  negro  boys  and  a  seam- 
stress. For  the  former  he  paid  $533  each,  and  for  the  latter  about 
$900.  I  saw  the  receipt  given  for  payment  and  the  warranty  of  title. 
The  slaves  are  '  warranted  slaves  for  life.'  There  is  something  both 
horrible  and  ludicrous  in  buying  and  selling  our  fellow-creatures, 
and  in  the  cool,  businesslike  way  in  which  the  invoices  are  made 
out,  just  as  if  they  were  so  many  bales  of  black  cloth.     I   permitted 

173 


1/4  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

the  purchase  to  be  made,  because  the  negroes  already  on  Dr.  Seip's 
plantation  are  overworked,  and  the  additional  hands  will  relieve 
them,  and  the  seamstress  was  bought  because  Mrs.  Seip  finds  that 
the  cutting  out  and  making  of  the  negroes'  clothing,  besides  her 
household  duties,  is  too  much  for  her  health. 

"  Monday,  yesterday,  and  to-day  I  have  been  very  busy  making 
arrangements  for  new  business  with  two  brothers,  planters  on  Red 
River.  One  of  them  is  married  to  a  sister  of  Mrs.  Seip.  His  name 
is  Flint,  and  he  is  a  lawyer.  You  may  recollect  I  dined  with  him 
when  I  was  at  Alexandria  last  year.  I  have  written  to-day  a  long 
letter  of  twelve  pages  (could  not  make  it  shorter),  with  a  report  on 
the  business  here,  to  the  trio.  I  have  had  a  letter  from  Tom  Sellar 
at  last,  but  it  is  dated  on  5th  inst.,  only  two  days  after  he  left  this. 
I  suppose  he  will  be  back  here  in  the  course  of  this  week,  after 
which  he  must  start  off  for  Attakapas.  Old  Davis  was  down  here 
yesterday,  which  may  make  it  unnecessary  for  me  to  go  to  Natchez, 
but  I  may  perhaps  go  to  our  Hollywood  plantation,  which  is  some 
five  hundred  miles  up  the  Mississippi  ;  it  is  above  Princeton. 

"  If  I  be  spared,  I  don't  know  but  I  may  manage  to  be  home  some 
time  in  March,  as,  unless  something  new  transpires  for  me  to  do,  I 
do  not  at  present  see  anything  to  detain  me  here  for  more  than  five 
or  six  days  after  the  arrival  of  the  English  steamer  of  February  4. 
Its  news  ought  to  be  here  by  about  March  4,  and,  if  so,  I  might  be 
back  in  New  York  by  March  15  or  20,  and  you  may  be  sure  if  I  can 
I  will,  for  I  do  long  to  clasp  you  to  my  heart  again,  and  to  see  my 
darling  children.  By  the  way,  a  person  called  at  the  office  this 
afternoon  and  said  one  of  the  draymen  had  found  a  bunch  of  five 
small  keys,  and  he  would  send  him  with  them  to  the  office  to-mor- 
row.    I  hope  they  may  prove  to  be  mine. 

"  Good-night  ;  God  bless  you  and  all  my  dear  ones.  I  am  now 
going  to  take  a  spell  at  Hallam's  '  Constitutional  History  '  by  way 
of  soporific  before  going  to  bed. 

"  January  15*  1846,  The  mail  has  failed  beyond  Charleston, 
consequently  no  New  York  letters  or  papers  are  forwarded  to-day, 
which  is  provoking  and  annoying.  This  day  has  been  set  apart  for 
thanksgiving  by  the  Governor  of  Louisiana,  and  at  eleven  o'clock 
I  intend  to  go  to  Dr.  Scott's  church.  It  is  the  first  Thanksgiving 
Day  ever  held  in  Louisiana,  and   I   look  upon  its  being  held  as  a 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1846.         175 

clear  proof  of  the  progress  of  Christianity,  and  the  increasing  influ- 
ence of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race.  There  is  something  particularly 
gratifying  in  seeing  this  State,  a  sort  of  prodigal  son  of  the  whole 
commonwealth,  returning,  as  it  were,  to  its  Father's  house.  May 
God  in  his  own  way  hasten  the  time  '  when  the  earth  shall  be  filled 
with  the  knowledge  of  the  Lord  as  the  waters  cover  the  channels  of 
the  sea.'  In  spite  of  the  family  bickerings  and  jealousy,  one  can't 
help  feeling  proud  of  this  kindred  nation,  the  most  Christian  next 
to  our  own,  and  next  to  it  also,  I  do  believe,  the  greatest  and  most 
powerful.  I  say  with  Balaam  :  '  I  bless  thee  and  thou  shalt  be 
blessed,'  and  may  God  in  his  mercy  avert  war  and  maintain  peace, 
destroy  the  corn  laws  and  the  tariff,  and  promote  free  trade  ! 

"  God  bless  you,  my  darling  wife,  bone  of  my  bone  and  flesh  of 
my  flesh  and  soul  of  my  soul,  and  may  he  watch  over  us  and  our 
dear  children. 

"  A  gentleman  met  me  last  night  in  the  reading  room,  and  said  : 
*  Mr.  Wood,  you  wear  uncommonly  well.  I  recollect  you  on  the 
Exchange  in  Liverpool  many,  many  years  ago.  You  used  to  be 
pointed  out  as  the  neatest  dressed  man  in  Liverpool.' 

"  Ever  thine  own  "  Wm.  W." 

"  New  Orleans,  January  16,  1864. 
"  My  Darling  Wife  : 

"  I  have  been  a  happy  man  this  day.  I  have  got  your  dear  letter 
of  6th  and  7th  inst.,  announcing  dear  Johnnie's  safe  arrival  and 
entire  convalescence,  and  I  have  found  my  keys.  They  were  brought 
back  to  me  by  a  drayman,  who  picked  them  up  on  the  levee.  I 
gave  him  two  dollars,  and  as  the  advertising  costs  other  four  dol- 
lars, they  will  just  stand  me  in  a  dollar  each,  so  that  they  are  truly 
valuable  keys  ;  but  it  was  better  to  pay  this  than  to  have  my  port- 
manteau, bag,  etc.,  broken  open  or  the  locks  picked.  I  wrote 
Mary  and  Anna  last  night,  and  added  a  postscript  this  morning, 
telling  them  of  Johnnie's  convalescence  and  return,  and  I  wrote  to 
Tom  Kane  to-day,  thanking  him  for  his  great  kindness  to  Johnnie. 
I  also  gave  ten  dollars  to  the  missionary  society  as  a  sort  of  thank- 
offering.  I  was  yesterday  (Thanksgiving  Day)  at  Dr.  Scott's 
church,  and  heard  an  eulogium  of  an  hour's  length  on  America  and 
its  people,  its  institutions,  its  soil,  its  rivers,  and  its  climate.     The 


176  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

text  was  :  '  Our  lines  have  fallen  to  us  in  pleasant  places  ;  yea,  we  have 
a  goodly  heritage.' 

"  You  give  me  a  delightful  scolding  for  talking  about  leaving  you 
every  year  for  six  months.  Now,  I  didn't  say  I  would  do  anything 
of  the  kind.  I  said,  if  I  recollect  right,  that,  to  carry  on  the  business 
to  perfection,  I  ought  to  do  so  for  about  five  months — but  that,  of 
course,  was  out  of  the  question.  The  fact  is  it  is  not  exactly  a 
question  between  leaving  and  not  leaving,  but  here  is  the  pinch  :  if 
we  all  be  spared  to  go  home,  I  feel  it  in  my  bones  that  if  I  live  I 
will  need  to  come  out  again  some  day,  and  if  you  and  the  children 
were  all  alive  and  well,  it  is  questionable  whether  we  could  then  all 
go  out  together.  Now,  it  is  possible  that  I  might  make  New  York 
my  headquarters,  and  by  going  perhaps  once  in  two  years  for  a 
month  to  New  Orleans,  or  perhaps  not  there  at  all,  and  once  in  two 
years  to  England  for  six  weeks,  I  might  have  the  business  better 
managed  and  we  might  all  live  comfortably  in  New  York.  We 
certainly  have  far  more  friends  there  than  in  Liverpool.  Or,  sup- 
posing we  did  not  decide  to  stay  there  altogether,  but  only  for 
another  year,  then  it  would  be  necessary  for  me  to  go  to  Liverpool 
by  July  16  packet  and  return  by  October  4  packet,  being  gone 
three  months.  There  are  a  great  many  inducements  to  remain  on 
this  side,  and  also  a  great  many  to  go  home  to  England.  I  could 
manage  the  matter  admirably  if  I  could  make  three  of  myself,  and 
be  present  at  one  and  the  same  time  in  Liverpool,  New  York,  and 
New  Orleans,  or  could  even  be  at  Liverpool  and  New  York.  I  really 
am  at  a  loss  what  to  do.  Your  letter  received  to-day  was  a  great 
relief  to  me,  because  in  it  you  seem  so  decided  about  not  parting 
that  your  leaving  New  York  would  not  be  such  a  sacrifice  to  you, 
but,  then,  that  was  on  the  supposition  of  my  being  away  five  months 
out  of  twelve,  of  which  I  have  no  intention.  If  you  are  perfectly 
willing  to  go  home  to  Liverpool,  I  am  sure  I  am,  but  I  am  afraid 
when  it  comes  to  the  time  you  will  feel  it  a  greater  pull  than  you 
imagine  ;  however,  the  parting  for  three  months  would  also  be  a 
sore  trial  for  us  both,  and  so  I  am  in  a  fix,  but  trust  that  God  will 
direct  us  to  do  what  is  right.  You  can't  think  how  delightful  your 
dear  reproaches  are  to  me  ;  it  is  so  sweet  to  be  assured  that  my 
presence  is  so  necessary  to  your  happiness.  Dear  wee  Willie  and 
'  Lady  '  Helen,  how  I  would  like  to  see  and  kiss  them  !     You  never 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1 846.        1 77 

mention  my  little  Harrie,  bless  her  roguish  looks  !  Can  she  spell 
'  f-a-t-a-1 '  yet  ? 

"  Tom  Sellar  is  still  in  the  sugar  districts.  I  had  a  few  lines 
from  him  to-day,  brought  by  a  Mr.  Cox,  a  planter,  at  whose  house 
he  had  been  staying.  I  intend  to  send  Charlotte  '  Eothen  '  through 
the  post  ofifice,  as  I  have  finished  it.  The  weather  is  heavenly. 
Good-night,  dearest. 

"  Sunday,  January  18,  1S46.  This  has  been  a  bleak,  cold  day, 
and  it  is  now  a  rainy  night.  I  was  at  Dr.  Scott's  morning  and 
evening.  I  saw  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Tom  Slidell,  and  they  walked  part  of 
the  way  home  with  me.  I  then  went  and  took  a  long  walk  by 
myself  up  the  Levee  to  Lafayette.  The  only  notable  things  I  saw 
were  a  cargo  of  German  immigrants  just  arrived  from  Bremen, 
and  a  dog  running  like  mad,  with  a  tin  kettle  tied  to  its  tail,  at  which 
latter  sight  I  could  not  help  laughing,  '  cruelty  to  animals,'  etc., 
notwithstanding.  I  then  came  home,  and  read  Goode  till  I  was  tired. 
He  is  rather  heavy  and  wordy,  though  his  doctrine  is  good.  Then 
read  a  bit  of  the  '  Life  of  Oliver  Cromwell,'  which  was  meat  and 
drink.  He  was  a  religious  man  after  my  own  heart,  and  no  hyp- 
ocrite and  no  humbug.  Then  dined  with  Mylne  ;  then  after  sit- 
ting a  while  went  to  church  in  the  wet  ;  then  home — read  the 
Bible,  took  another  dose  of  Goode's  '  Better  Covenant '  and  a  little 
bit  of  Cromwell,  and  finished  off  with  an  article  in  the  Albion  about 
Oregon.  I  would  not  do  this  at  home,  but  really  with  nobody  to 
speak  to  or  see  me, — for  both  Mylne  and  Murray  are  always  out  in 
the  evening,  and  the  servants  here  are  in  the  back  yard, — I  am  not 
going  to  perform  the  hypocrisy  of  doing  nothing,  and  I  can't  read 
the  Bible  all  day.  I  shall,  by  God's  blessing,  walk  circumspectly, 
but  as  David  ate  the  sheiti  bread  when  he  was  hungry,  so  will  I 
read  sober  and  discreet  newspapers  or  books  when  I  have  duly  per- 
formed my  religious  duties  and  readings,  and  am  locked  up  by 
myself  in  this  sort  of  solitary  confinement.  My  own  conscience 
doesn't  bother  me  under  the  '  suckamstances,'  as  Jeames  de  la 
Pluche  says,  and  so  neither  need  yours.  But  my  ink  is  done,  and 
so  good-night,  and  God  bless  you  and  all  my  dear  ones.  By  the 
way,  if  Johnnie's  visit  to  Philadelphia  only  cost  $16.75,  ^"d  you 
saved  %\^  in  his  board  at  the  New  York  Hotel,  the  net  expense  was 
only  $1.75. 


178  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  Monday,  January  19,  1846.  This  is  a  very  wet,  cold,  disagree- 
able morning.  I  send  herewith  the  Picayutie  of  yesterday.  On  the 
first  page  of  it  you  will  find  a  full  report  of  the  sentence  on  Dr.  Scott. 
By  the  way,  although  I  want  John  Walter  and  Charlotte  to  write 
every  alternate  Saturday,  that  was  not  to  say  that  yoti  are  not  to 
write  to  me  twice  a  week,  my  lady  fair.  My  latest  from  you  is  7th 
inst. ;  nothing  from  J.  W.  or  Charlotte.  I  sent  the  latter  '  Eothen  ' 
on  Friday.  Tom  Sellar  seems  to  be  getting  on  very  well  in  the 
sugar  country,  and  he  may,  perhaps,  visit  Cuba,  Porto  Rico,  and 
Santa  Cruz  before  his  return  to  New  York.  Don't  say  anything 
about  this  intended  voyage  of  his,  but  ask  Mr.  De  Peyster  from  me 
if  he  is  acquainted  with  anyone  in  Santa  Cruz,  and,  if  so,  ask  him  to 
give  you  a  letter  of  introduction  for  Tom  Sellar,  and  send  it  on  to 
me  immediately.  God  bless  and  protect  you  and  me  and  our  dear 
children. 

"  Ever  thine  own  attached 

"  Wm.  W." 

"New  York,  Sunday,  January  18,  1846. 
"  My  Beloved  William  : 

"  Your  last  reached  me  on  Friday  evening  upon  my  return  from 
Maria's  party.  I  tore  up  the  greater  part  of  the  first  sheet,  as  I 
suppose  you  thought  I  would.  Don't  give  way  to  such  thoughts  ; 
they  could  do  you  no  good,  and  will  only  serve  to  lead  you  into 
temptation,  and,  without  God  withhold  you,  may  lead  you  into  actual 
sin,  from  which  may  God  in  his  mercy  keep  us  both.  I  am  sorry 
to  see  you  are  somewhat  bothered  as  to  business  matters  ; 
those  remarks  I  also  cut  out  of  my  budget  before  I  numbered  it 
to  put  away  with  the  others.  I  always  keep  my  last  in  my  pocket, 
and  refresh  myself  daily  with  a  read  at  it  till  I  get  another.  I 
am  glad  your  mind  is  so  undecided  about  our  future  place  of 
residence,  for  our  future  is  already  fixed  for  us,  and  when  it  comes 
to  be  time  for  us  to  decide,  I  hope  to  either  place  we  may  be  rec- 
onciled. One  thing,  though,  I  think  must  decide  our  choice,  for  it 
surely  cannot  be  the  will  of  God  that  those  whom  he  has  joined 
should  for  any  business  or  worldly  good  be  separated,  or  that  a 
father  should  be  continually  leaving  the  children  whom  God  has  given 
him,  to  seek  bread  for  them   in   more  abundance.     If  the  necessaries 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1 846.        1 79 

of  life  were  wanting,  and  no  other  way  to  procure  them,  then 
perhaps  it  would  be  his  duty  to  leave  them.  It  is  a  relief  to 
me  that  you  have  again  some  of  my  letters.  I  told  you  J.  W.'s 
greatcoat  was  stolen  from  the  school,  and  that  the  police  had  been 
in  search  of  it.     If  you  have  not  that  letter,  one  must  be  missing. 

"  I  well  remember  Dr.  Seip,  and  his  ivife,  too.  I  think  your 
answer  to  Pelton  was  very  good.  The  Spencers  were  at  the  Astor 
for  a  few  days.     I  called,  but  did  not   see  them,  and  they  are  gone. 

"  The  Mills'  on  Thursday  was  a  handsome  party,  but  I  thought 
very  dull.  Julia  looked  well,  and  behaved  admirably.  She  fre- 
quently sends  you  her  love.  Juan  Rowland  was  there  ;  neither  he 
nor  I  complimented  each  other.  He  said  I  had  lost  all  my  former 
self  in  the  Englishwoman,  and  I  said  he  looked  like  a  wild  Arab  or 
man  of  the  East. 

"The  weather  is  awfully  cold,  hard  snow  on  the  ground,  and 
freezing  hard  to-night.  The  smoke  has  annoyed  us  dreadfully, 
so  that  we  can  have  no  fire  in  the  nursery.  The  men  are  still 
engaged  with  the  chimneys,  but  if  not  cured  we  must  go.  My 
bedroom  smokes  daily  from  the  other  rooms  as  well  (back  smoke). 
Mr.  De  Peyster  has  just  been  here,  and  begs  me  on  no  account 
to  omit  his  kind  remembrances,  which  he  often  sends.  Poor  Anna 
Winthrop  is  again  spitting  blood,  and  very,  very  thin  and  delicate. 
Dr.  Hutton's  sermon  to-day  only  so-so.  John  Walter  went  this 
afternoon,  but  none  of  the  rest  of  us,  on  account  of  the  snow. 
God  bless  my  own  loved  one. 

"  Ever  your  own  "  H." 

"  50  Chartres  Street,  New  Orleans, 

"  January  19,  1846. 
"  My  Sweet  Wife  : 

"  I  sent  off  my  letter  of  i8th  inst.  to  you  this  morning, 
rather  hurriedly,  having  several  letters  to  write,  and  soon  after  it 
had  gone  I  received  yours  of  loth  inst.  covering  one  of  the  9th  from 
my  dear  John  Walter,  giving  a  very  good  account  of  his  visit  to 
Philadelphia.  Tell  him  the  firm  here  is  not  J.  &  A.  D.  &  Co.  but 
A.  &  J.  D.  &  Co.  His  direction  was  crowded  rather  too  near  the 
bottom  of  the  letter,  and  the  letter  itself  was  not  quite  orthodoxly 
folded  ;  but,  what  is  of  much   more  consequence,  the  matter  was 


l80  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

good.  If  we  should  be  here  next  summer,  I  would  like  nothing 
better  than  his  taking  a  pedestrian  excursion  through  New  England 
except  going  myself,  but,  if  we  be  all  spared,  I  suspect  we  shall 
be  in  England  or  on  the  ocean  in  July.  I  suppose  Johnnie  and 
Charlotte  don't  care  about  my  writing  to  them,  as  they  hear  all  the 
news  from  you.  You  may  be  sure  I  was  delighted  to  get  a  letter 
ixoxxx you  along  with  Johnnie's.  I  suppose,  you  dear  little  'mother 
in  Israel,'  you  never  will  get  beyond  No.  7,  at  least  in  letters,  for  the 
one  to-day  is  at  least  the  second  of  that  perfect  and  mystical  num- 
ber. That  dear  blessed  little  Willie  will  be  the  death  of  me  with 
his  sweet  ways,  and  his  questions  about  '  Ai,'  and  'if  you  loved 
your  wife  ';  and  at  last  you  have  mentioned  my  little  Harrie,  and  she 
sends  her  love  to  me  !  and  now  I  send  mine  to  her,  and  beg  you  will 
give  her  a  sweet  kiss  from  me  and  a  picayune  to  buy  candy.  This 
has  been  a  dismal  day,  pouring  of  rain,  yet  the  air  like  milk,  or  rather 
like  a  vapor  bath.  To-night  it  is  thundering  and  lightning  grandly, 
the  house  shaking  to  its  foundations,  and  the  lightning  '  paling  the 
ineffectual  fires  '  of  the  spermaceti  candles. 

"  So  far  I  have  got  all  my  work  finished,  and  I  am  completely  at 
a  loose  end,  except  for  the  work  which  each  day  may  bring  forth. 
I  mean  I  have  worked  up  all  arrears,  but  there  are  about  three 
difficult  matters  I  have  to  arrange  before  I  can  leave,  and  I  must 
await  the  arrival  of  the  steamer's  letters  of  January  4  and  February 
4,  the  latter  of  which  ought  to  be  here  by  March  4  or  6,  after  which 
I  hope  to  turn  my  face  northward,  unless  some  new  and  unforeseen 
business  springs  up.  That  would  only  be  forty-six  days  after  this  I 
might  be  leaving,  or  six  weeks  and  four  days. 

"  It  is  odd  enough  that  J.  W.  should  have  got '  Old  Noll's  Life  '  to 
read.  Good-night,  beloved  ;  I  am  just  going  to  take  a  spell  at  it 
myself.     God  bless  you  and  our  dear  ones. 

"  January  21,  1846.  Yesterday  was  a  cold,  bleak  day.  In  the 
evening  I  was  told  that  there  was  going  to  be  a  duel  fought  this 
morning  between  a  Mr.  J.  W.  Kane  and  a  Mr.  Hyman,  the  latter  an 
Englishman,  and  the  former  a  Kentuckian  and  a  lawyer,  whose 
office  is  near  to  ours.  I  was  not  told  till  late  at  night,  but  I  was 
much  inclined  to  go  to  the  mayor  and  tell  him  or  send  him  a  note, 
but,  not  knowing  where  he  lived,  and  not  being  quite  sure  that  it 
would  take  place,  besides  having  been  told   in  confidence,  I  did  not 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1 846.        181 

do  either.  This  morning  the  two  men  met,  away  far  down  Canal 
Street,  exchanged  shots  without  effect,  and  then  an  effort  was  made 
by  the  seconds  to  adjust  matters.  I  ought  to  tell  you  that  at  a  ball 
at  the  St.  Charles  Hotel,  the  night  before  last,  Mr.  Kane  and  his 
partner  came  and  stood  before  Mr.  Hyman  and  his  partner,  although 
the  latter  had  engaged  the  vis-a-vis,  whereupon  Hyman  told  him  he 
was  no  gentleman  ;  after  this  Kane  came  and  slapped  him  in  the  face. 
Well,  Hyman's  second  proposed  after  the  first  fire  that  Kane  should 
apologize  for  the  blow,  and  then  Hyman  should  apologize  to  Kane 
for  calling  him  no  gentleman,  but  Kane's  second  said  :  '  No  ;  apolo- 
gize for  the  words  first,  and  then  our  principal  will  apologize  for  the 
blow.'  But  quite  properly,  according  to  the  principles  of  this  sinful 
and  foolish  code  of  honor,  Hyman's  second  said  :  *  No  ;  the  blow 
must  be  first  apologized  for,  and  then  the  words  may  be  taken  back.' 
This  not  being  assented  to,  they  fired  again,  and  Hyman's  shot  struck 
Kane  on  the  shoulder,  and,  glancing  from  it,  cut  him  right  through 
the  vertebrae  of  the  neck,  and  he  fell  down  stone  dead.  I  am  told  he 
was  a  very  fine-looking  young  man  of  twenty-three  or  twenty-four. 
Sad,  sad  /  It  has  made  me  almost  sick.  They  say  he  was  engaged 
to  a  Miss  Ward  of  St.  Louis.  However,  everyone  says  Kane  was 
to  blame,  and  that  Hyman  did  all  that  could  be  expected  to  accom- 
modate matters. 

"  I  dined  at  Mr.  Mills'  to-day  ;  Camac  and  some  other  men 
there.  A  Mr.  Spangenberg  who  was  there  had  seen  Kane's  corpse, 
and  said  he  looked  exactly  as  if  he  were  asleep.  He  is  the  son  of  a 
General  Kane  of  Kentucky.  I  wonder  if  he  can  be  any  relative  of 
yours  ?  I  did  not  know  either  him  or  his  adversary  by  sight,  but  I 
don't  know  anything  that  has  horrified  or  disgusted  me  more  for  a 
long  time,  and  the  cool  and  easy  v/ay  in  which  everyone  takes  the 
matter  is  astonishing. 

"  This  has  been  a  fine  clear  day.  I  am  fairly  at  a  loose  end  for 
something  to  do.  I  have  got  all  my  work  done,  as  far  as  I  can  do  it 
now.  I  must  wait  for  the  action  of  others.  Good-night  ;  God  bless 
and  watch  over  us  and  our  dear  children. 

"January  22,  1846.  Hurrah!  Free  trade  forever!  News 
received  direct  from  England  of  December  11.  Peel  and  the  duke 
kicked  out.  Lord  John  and  the  League  in.  The  only  mischief  is 
that  Lord  Palraerston  is  more  warlike  than  old  Lord  Aberdeen,  and 


1 82  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

SO  there  may  be  more  likelihood  of  war  with  the  United  States.  On 
the  other  hand,  the  Whigs  as  a  party  have  always  prided  themselves 
on  their  peace  policy,  and  so  may  counterpoise  Palmerston's  bellig- 
erent propensities.  I  don't  believe  there  will  be  war,  and  free 
trade  will  unite  the  two  countries  closer  than  ever.  Thank  God 
for  this  consummation.  I  send  a  paper  with  an  account  of  the 
duel.     God  bless  you  and  our  dear  children. 

"  Ever  thine, 

"Wm.  W." 

"New  York  Hotel,  Room  i6.  Bride's  Parlor, 
"Wednesday,  January  21,  1846. 
"  My  Beloved  William  : 

"Your  letter  of  nth  inst.  reached  me  about  2  p.  m.  to-day,  and 
a  very  delightful  letter  it  was.  Your  mind,  I  think,  is  now  at  rest 
about  J.  W.,  that  he  is  likely  long  to  live.  If  a  good  share  of 
impudence,  strong  love  of  mischief,  an  enormous  nose,  and  a  bright 
eye  are  any  test  of  robust  health,  he  has  them  all.  Your  allusion 
to  our  chimney  was  what  I  would  call  '  an  apt  allusion  to  a  well- 
known  story,  '  for  chimneys  I  have  now  some  reason  to  be  acquainted 
with.  When  I  thought  of  changing  our  lodgings,  rest  assured  it  was 
not  a  small  matter  that  would  have  made  me  take  such  a  step, 
knowing  as  I  do  your  dislike  to  all  changes  except  political  ones  ; 
and  after  I  had  got  all  my  wardrobes  and  trunks  arranged  for  a  per- 
manent resting  place,  to  say  nothing  of  the  near  vicinity  of  schools 
and  church,  sisters  and  doctor.  Well,  but  the  dream  is  over  now  ; 
the  climax  is  past — it  was  'kill  or  cure'  to-day,  and  thankful  am  I  to 
say  the  doctor  of  chimneys  has  won  the  battle.  Since  our  last  sweep- 
ing of  the  three  worst  chimneys  they  have  kept  up  alternate  smokings 
of  the  most  dreadful  character,  not  every  day,  but  every  other  day  or 
so  ;  and  the  children's  clothes,  my  clothes,  quilts,  curtains,  and  car- 
pets have  been  covered  with  soot  and  dirt.  The  chimney  doctors 
put  off  and  put  off,  and  my  temper  was  tried  to  the  utmost.  Mr. 
De  Peyster  went  to  Whitman  and  Comstock  and  said:  '  I  don't  know 
who  had  the  renting  of"  the'se  rooms,  whether  Mr.  Billings  or  some 
other  person,  but  whoever  it  was  deserved  a  harsher  name  than  I 
would  like  to  utter,  and  one  that  rises  now  to  my  lips,  and  so  will 
everyone  think  of  his  conduct.'     Comstock  said  :    '  I  hope,  Mr.  De 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    I  846.        185 

Peyster,  that  you  are  aware  that  /  had  nothing  at  all  to  do  with  this, 
but  the  person  who  made  the  agreement  with  Mr.  Wood  never  men- 
tioned the  circumstance  of  these  ever  smoking  till  the  question  was 
put  to  him,  and  then  replied  :  "  I  am  sorry  to  say  in  some  winds  some 
of  these  chimneys  smoke."  '  Poor  Mr.  Whitman  came  to  me  and  told 
me  what  Mr.  De  Peyster  said  (he  himself  having  previously  told  me)^ 
and  said  he  must  exonerate  Mr.  Billings  from  all  blame,  and  himself, 
in  as  far  as  they  were  simply  smoky  chimneys  before,  but  that  cer- 
tainly for  the  last  two  months  no  one  could  have  imagined  such  an 
extent  of  nuisance.  I  understand  that  the  taste  of  the  smoke  which 
has  gone  upstairs  has  made  me  an  object  of  the  greatest  pity  to  all 
the  ladies,  and  Captain  Comstock  (who  is  very  attentive)  has  almost 
cried  with  vexation  and  compassion,  and  said  :  '  Mrs.  Wood,  no 
mortal  can  live  in  these  rooms  ;  it  is  awful  ;  but  if  you  can  bear  it  a 
little  longer,  no  money  shall  be  spared  to  get  them  right  if  they  can 
be  righted.'  On  Saturday  last  matters  reached  the  climax  in  our 
nursery,  and  for  the  third  time  the  carpet  was  taken  up  and  the  fire 
allowed  to  go  out.  On  Sunday  it  was  tried  again,  and  the  immense 
volume  of  smoke  that  filled  the  lobbies  upstairs,  from  our  door  being 
open,  made  a  rush  of  gentlemen  down  to  the  room  to  ascertain  for 
themselves  if  the  house  were  on  fire.  All  the  beds  were  now  moved 
into  my  bedroom,  and  the  parlor  only  smoking  occasionally,  we 
could  make  the  room  pretty  warm  for  the  children  by  leaving  the 
door  open.  Our  intense  cold  weather  began  on  Saturday  also,  and 
Powell's  rheumatism,  and  it  was  almost  impossible  to  keep  warm. 
In  the  meantime  I  had  been  looking  about  for  lodgings,  but  could 
find  none.  To-day  and  yesterday  it  has  been  snowing  hard  and 
freezing,  and  there  is  grand  sleighing,  which  makes  the  children  shout 
with  delight,  the  gay  sleighs  with  four  horses  passing  constantly. 
Well,  while  sitting  around  our  parlor  fire  to-day  a  horrid  rattling 
began,  and  I  said  :  '  It  is  only  the  men  at  the  chimneys.'  Scarcely 
were  the  words  out  of  my  mouth  when  we  were  all  covered  with  soot 
from  head  to  foot  ;  down  came  firebricks,  smoke,  and  soot,  and  half 
the  room  from  the  fall  of  soot  was  blackened  like  an  old  shoe.  We 
scampered  in  all  directions,  and  now  what  was  to  be  done  ?  It  was 
snowing  outside,  and  the  snow  knee  deep,  and  not  a  place  but  my 
cold  bedroom  for  us  all  to  go  to.  Fortunately,  the  bride.  No.  16,  is 
away  for  a  few  days,  so  a  fire  was  immediately  put  on  in  her  parlor^ 


l84  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

and  here  we  all  are.  The  girls  have  all  been  home  to-day  on  account 
of  the  severe  weather,  and  here  I  sit  wrapped  up  in  my  large  woolen 
shawl,  and  with  fur  slippers,  writing  you  an  account  of  our  disasters 
now  that  I  verily  believe  they  are  fairly  over.  The  noise,  etc.,  pro- 
ceeded from  the  introduction  of  the  apparatus  prepared  for  the 
chimneys,  and  ever  since  both  nursery  and  parlor  for  about  six  hours 
have  drawn  beautifully.  The  stove  was  taken  down  and  a  fire 
lighted  in  the  grate  of  Liverpool  coal,  and  as  it  has  not  smoked  one 
bit,  and  this  is  the  very  worst  wind,  we  hope  the  evil  is  all  over.  In 
the  meantime  our  room  is  an  empty  one,  all  the  beds  and  children 
still  in  mine,  but  a  grand  fire  on,  and  to-morrow  it  is  to  be  thoroughly 
cleaned  and  a  neio  carpet  put  down,  and  that  horrid  furnace  of  a 
stove  is  away,  which,  as  it  did  not  remedy  the  smoke,  was  a  double 
nuisance.  Six  women  have  been  employed  scouring  our  parlor  car- 
pet and  chairs,  two  more  at  the  paint,  and  a  man  at  the  glass  ;  so 
that,  though  damp,  the  room  smells  clean  and  soapy,  and  looks  very 
nice  with  a  fine,  clear,  rousing  fire,  and  orders  have  been  given  by  Mr. 
Whitman  that  both  fires  are  to  be  kept  up  all  night.  Powell  has  fiever 
been  ill.  I  said,  I  believe,  '  that  she  was  well  or  nearly  so  ';  I  meant 
pretty  well,  as  she  has  been  complaining  a  good  deal  of  rheumatism 
and  sore  throat ;  she  seems  pretty  well  again  to-day  and  is  very 
cheerful.  This  parlor  is  not  nearly  so  nice  as  ours  ;  and  as  our  table 
and  attendance  are  now  so  good,  I  should  have  been  sorry  to  leave 
the  house.  There  were  no  other  rooms  in  the  house  vacant,  or  I 
would  have  had  them.  We  have  just  been  eating  a  pitcher  of  snow 
and  raspberry  brandy,  concocted  by  J.  W.,  with  a  taste  of  lemon  and 
loaf  sugar  in  it,  and  very  good  sherbet  it  made.  Helen  and  Willie 
were  to  have  gone  to-day  to  a  party  at  Philip  Hone's  from  twelve  to 
three.  Written  invitations  from  Miss  Mary  Schermerhorn  Hone. 
All  the  first  little  children  in  the  town  were  to  be  there,  and  about 
one-third  of  their  mothers  ;  but  notes  came  round  again,  saying, 
*  owing  to  the  inclemency  of  the  weather.  Miss  Hone  would  see  her 
friends  another  day.'  I  had  planned  their  dresses  for  them,  and 
think  they  will  look  very  sweet.  Helen  improves  in  beauty  and 
intelligence  every  day.  You  ask  about  Harrie.  She  has  gone  to  bed 
laughing  and  blushing  at  your  request  to  know  something  about  her. 
I  said  :  *  Harrie,  what  can  I  say  ?  '  She  replied  :  '  Tell  him  for  one 
week  I'll  try  to  do  nothing  wrong.'     She  is  no  worse  than  when  you 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1846.        185 

left,  but  I  really  cannot  say  she  is  much  better  ;  at  school  she  does 
well,  and  is  improving  very  fast  in  her  studies.  Bessie  has  always  a 
medal,  and  is  a  dear,  sweet  child,  and  so  are  Charlotte  and  Willie. 
J.  Walter  has  brought  home  his  character  certificates  for  the  last  two 
months — both  excellent. 

"What  do  you  think  of  the  change  of  ministry,  and  repeal  of 
those  odious  corn  laws  ? 

"  I  am  very  glad  poor  Dr.  Scott  has  been  acquitted. 

"  I  know  how  the  loss  of  your  keys  must  have  bothered  you,  and 
trust,  my  darling,  that  your  advertisement  saved  you  having  the 
annoyance  of  all  .the  good  locks  being  picked.  Just  so  I  felt  about 
J.  W.'s  greatcoat  being  lost ;   I  could  not  bear  to  give  it  up. 

"  I  agree  with  you  that  you  will  do  well  to  keep  clear  of  '  the 
younger  women.'  You  are  too  young  a  brother  to  treat  them  as 
sisters,  and  certainly  I  would  call  no  msiw  father  upon  earth. 

"  Anna  R.  has  written  me  several  friendly  notes  lately  ;  ttvo  came 
to-day,  the  first  begging  me  to  come  and  pass  a  long  day  with  her  with 
all  the  children,  the  younger  to  dine  with  her  at  one  o'clock,  and  the 
rest  with  us  at  five.  I  excused  myself  for  this  week  on  account  of 
Anna  Winthrop's  illness,  and  she  then  wrote,  asking  more  about 
Anna,  and  begged  me  to  fix  the  first  Friday  or  Saturday  that  she  was 
better.  I  said  I  would coxvlq  when  she  was  better  some  Saturday  and 
bring  the  three  eldest  with  me,  as  they  go  to  school  on  other  days  ; 
she  then  repeated  her  invitation  for  the  younger  ones  also. 

"  Anna  Wintiirop  has  had  attacks  of  fainting  and  spitting  of  blood, 
and  on  Monday  we  were  much  alarmed  about  her  ;  and  Maria,  who 
was  sent  for,  spent  the  day  with  her,  or  part  of  it,  and  on  Tuesday 
both  she  and  I  went  to  Anna's  together.  I  read  to  her  the  Bible  and 
talked  to  her,  and  ate  her  broiled  chicken,  while  Maria  rubbed  her 
limbs  with  cayenne  and  put  on  her  blister.  She  is  very  much  better 
to-day,  but  Berger  says  great  care  will  be  necessary.  It  is  very  late 
and  the  children  are  anxious  to  go  to  bed.  God  bless  thee,  my  own 
loved  W.  Don't  fret  thy  dear  soul  about  going  home  or  staying 
here.     It  is  2X\.  fixed  for  us  already. 

"  Thine  own  "  H. 

"January  22,  1846.     No  smoke  ;  all  well." 


1 86  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  New  Orleans,  Sunday,  January  25,  1846. 
"  My  Own  Sweet  Wife  : 

"I  finished  my  last  to  you  on  2 2d  inst.,  and  have  been  in  daily 
expectation  of  receiving  a  letter  from  you,  and  have  been  doomed 
to  daily  disappointment.  I  fully  expected  a  letter  from  you  to-day, 
but  none  came,  although  I  have  two  from  Dawson  of  14th  and  15th 
inst.  The  latter  date  being  Thursday,  if  you  wrote  on  Wednesday 
I  ought  to  have  got  your  letter  to-day.  If  I  don't  hear  to-morrow, 
I  shall  begin  to  fear  that  some  of  the  dear  children  or  yourself 
are  ill. 

"  Since  my  last  the  weather  has  been  very  fine,  cool,  and  bracing. 
This  afternoon  it  became  rather  warm  in  the  sun.  My  life  goes  on 
pretty  monotonously, — I  have  been  rather  busier  these  last  few  days, 
— but  as  I  have  done  all  /  can  do,  and  the  progress  of  matters  I  have 
on  hand  depends  upon  others,  I  can  only  wait  patiently,  driving  on 
all  I  can,  pushing  here  and  pushing  there,  according  to  use  and 
wont.  It  is  a  great  pity  you  are  not  here  now  instead  of  last  year, 
because  now  my  business  is  m  New  Orleans  instead  of  being  all  over 
the  face  of  the  earth.  Tom  Sellar  has  not  yet  returned  from  his 
wanderings,  but  I  look  for  him  daily,  I  may  say  hourly. 

"  The  Upper  Mississippi,  Missouri,  and  Ohio  have  got  thawed  and 
the  waters  in  them  have  risen,  and  the  number  of  steamboats  and  the 
quantity  of  produce  of  all  kinds  arriving  are  perfectly  miraculous.  I 
only  wish  De  Peyster  saw  it.  Thousands  and  thousands  of  barrels 
of  flour,  beef,  pork,  ham,  bales  of  hemp  and  cotton,  hogsheads  of 
sugar,  barrels  of  molasses,  mountains  of  bacon  and  shoulders  in 
bulk,  and  sacks  of  corn,  all  piled  upon  the  Levee  as  discharged  from 
the  steamers  ;  while,  on  the  other  hand,  there  are  piled  up  on  the 
Levee,  going  on  board  steamers,  hundreds  of  bags  of  coffee,  cotton- 
seed, plows,  carriages,  pianos,  furniture  of  all  sorts,  corn  mills, 
frying  pans,  brooms,  pails,  '  bodies  and  souls  of  men,'  meaning 
negro  slaves.  As  many  as  seventeen  to  twenty  large  steamers  are 
arriving  in  a  day,  and  ten  to  fifteen  going  away,  and  all  these  im- 
mense quantities  of  merchandise  must  be  removed  from  the  Levee 
in  twenty-four  hours,  or  the  owners  will  be  fined.  Besides  all  which 
there  are  some  hundred  large  ships  loading  and  unloading  to  and 
from  foreign  ports,  so  that  the  five  thousand  and  odd  drays  belong- 
ing to  the  city  are  all  too  few  for  the  work,  and  De  Peyster  may  well 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1 846.        1 8/ 

exclaim  :  '  You  don't  mean  that  ! '  but  it's  a  fact.  Drays  at  present 
are  hardly  to  be  had  for  love  or  money.  The  Levee  I  consider  at  a 
time  like  the  present  as  one  of  the  wonders  of  the  world,  and  I  love 
at  the  glorious  sunsets  to  stroll  along  it  by  myself  and  meditate  on 
the  present  and  wondrous  future  destiny  of  this  glorious  country. 
However,  now  that  we  are  going  to  get  the  corn  laws  repealed 
(which,  by  the  way,  will  accelerate  the  growth  of  this  country  in  a 
miraculous  manner),  our  own  dear,  damp,  dismal  country  will  be 
worth  living  in,  and  a  noble  country  it  is  to  have  produced  Oliver 
Cromwell,  if  it  never  had  produced  another  man  celebrated  in  the 
world's  history. 

"  Dr.  Scott  having  gone  to  preach  at  Mobile,  I  went  this  morning 
to  Dr.  Hawk's  and  heard  a  very  well-delivered,  orthodox  sermon, 
but  there  was  a  want  of  heart  about  it.  The  ladies  were  beautifully 
dressed.  The  church  looked  like  a  parterre  of  tulips.  I  saw  Helen 
Kane  (Mrs.  S.  Nicholson)  there  ;  she  was  suitably  and  plainly  dressed 
in  a  mazarine  blue  bonnet  and  fawn-colored  cloak.  I  thought  I 
saw  our  yellow-haired  friend  of  the  IVabash  Valley,  Mrs.  Randolph, 
I  mean.  Henry  Clay  was  there,  a  venerable,  benevolent-looking 
old  gentleman,  of  upward  of  six  feet  high  at  least,  and  very  erect, 
with  rather  bald  head,  his  hair  combed  smooth  back  and  rather  long 
behind,  and  pretty  gray  withal,  a  florid  complexion  and  high  nose, 
and  clear,  blue,  intelligent  eyes.  But  he  has  a  villainous,  ugly, 
American  mouth,  like  a  large  slit  in  a  piece  of  leather,  without  lips  ; 
his  forehead  neither  very  big  nor  very  broad,  but  good.  A  man 
likely  to  win  the  strong  attachment  of  those  about  him,  but  not  a 
man  to  'go  thorough,'  as  that  old  scamp  Archbishop  Laud  used  to 
talk  about,  and  as  my  friend  President  Polk  would  do. 

"  I  took  a  walk  before  dinner  with  Mylne  down  the  river  to  the 
first  turn,  where  you  have  a  reach  of  six  miles  in  view.  I  am  glad 
to  say  that  the  river  here  begins  at  last  to  show  symptoms  of  a  rise, 
and  if  it  continue  to  do  so  we  shall  ere  long  have  plenty  of  cotton 
down. 

"  I  suppose  by  this  time  next  week  we  shall  have  the  letters  per 
steamer  of  January  4,  which  are  looked  for  with  intense  interest, 
both  as  regards  political  and  mercantile  matters.  By  the  way,  this 
letter  will  reach  you  in  February,  and  when  you  get  it,  you  may  say 
of  me,  if  all  be  spared,  we  shall  meet  next  month.     I   heard  a  Dr. 


l88  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Hamilton  of  Mobile,  I  believe,  preach  this  evening  at  Dr.  Scott's  ; 
not  a  bad  sermon,  but  too  long  and  too  fine.  Text  in  the  morning  : 
'  By  grace  ye  are  saved.'  In  the  evening  :  'Who  are  these  in  white 
robes?'  Good-night  ;  God  bless  you  and  me  and  our  dear  children. 
"January  26,  1846.  The  mail  has  as  usual  failed  beyond  Mobile, 
consequently  I  have  no  letters  from  you.  This  is  a  lovely  morning, 
clear,  bright,  and  warm.  To-night  there  is  to  be  a  grand  fancy  ball 
given  by  Mr.  A.  Ledoux,  to  which  all  the  fashionables  are  going. 
Murray  Thomson  is  going  in  a  very  handsome  Highland  dress. 
Mylne  has  got  leave  to  go  in  plain  clothes,  on  account  of  his 
advanced  age  !  I  might  have  got  an  invitation  if  I  had  wanted  it, 
but  felt  no  inclination.  God  forever  bless  and  watch  over  you  and 
my  dear  ones. 

"  Ever  your  attached  husband, 

"William  Wood." 

"New  York,  January  25,  1846,  Sunday  Evening. 
"  I  have  not  heard  from  you,  my  beloved  one,  since  yours  of  Jan- 
uary 12,  and  begin  anxiously  to  expect  the  arrival  of  No.  25.  You 
will  be  glad  to  hear  that  the  parlor  and  nursery  have  been  quite  free 
from  smoke  ever  since  my  last  to  you  was  written,  and  the  children 
are  now  in  their  own  room,  and  that  a  clean  one.  Sixty  days  of 
our  pilgrimage  are  over  since  we  parted,  my  dearest  Will,  and  should 
you  prove  as  bad  as  your  word,  and  not  reach  here  before  April  i,  I 
have  just  sixty-five  more  to  bear  without  you.  I  went  to  my  bed- 
room this  afternoon,  and,  after  locking  the  door,  kneeled  at  the  spot 
where  we  last  knelt  together  the  morning  you  went  away,  a  chair  at 
the  foot  of  the  bed,  and  there  poured  out  my  supplications  to  God 
on  behalf  of  your  precious  self  and  my  children.  Dear  wee  Harrie 
last  night  repeated  her  prayer  to  me  with  a  trembling  voice,  and 
seemed  much  softened  and  subdued.  To-day  I  read  to  her  and 
Willie  a  chapter  in  the  Acts  and  one  in  Proverbs,  expounding  as  I 
went  along,  and  they  seemed  much  impressed,  dear  Willie  saying  at 
the  end  :  'Yes,  that  was  a  beautiful  chapter,  mamma.'  Dear  Bessie 
has  learned  the  whole  of  the  Epistle  to  Titus,  word  for  word,  in  the 
last  week.  She  did  this  of  her  own  free  will  in  her  play  hours,  and 
recited  it  to  me  beautifully.  She  has  now  begun  Matthew,  and 
learned   the    ist  chapter   from  the   i8th    verse,  and   part  of  the   2d 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER    OF    1 846.        1 89 

chapter.  I  went  with  her  yesterday  to  have  her  fifth  and  last  bad 
tooth  taken  out,  and  she  is  to  have  one  filled,  one  of  her  permanent 
teeth,  and  then  her  miseries  are  over  for  the  present.  She  cried  this 
time,  so  that  she  did  not  behave  so  well  as  before,  but  she  says  now, 
with  a  deep  blush,  as  I  told  her  what  I  had  written  :  'But  I  cried 
before  it  was  taken  out,  mamma,  as  I  did  not  want  that  one  taken 
out,  as  it  did  not  ache,  and  I  told  you  I  was  ashamed  of  myself 
for  it.'  This  she  did.  She  has  pretty  bad  chilblains,  and  goes  limp- 
ing about  with  large  shoes.  Harrie  wanted  Parmley  to  take  out  a 
tooth  for  her,  and  insisted  that  there  was  one  that  ached  and  ought 
to  come  out.  He  examined  her  mouth  and  said  there  was  not  a 
single  thing  to  be  done  in  it.  This  was  last  time.  Yesterday  I  left 
her  at  home,  and  when  I  returned  with  Elizabeth,  there  was  she 
with  a  tumbler  in  her  hand  and  a  bloody  mouth,  holding  up  her 
tooth  and  saying  :  '  There  it  is.  Fve  got  it  ! '  She  is  looking  very 
pretty  just  now,  as  is  also  wee  Helen,  but  Willie  looks  ugly  and 
coarse. 

"  I  inclose  you  a  letter  from  Ferguson,  by  which  you  will  see  poor 
Mary  was  ill.  I  took  the  liberty  of  reading  it  first,  as  there  were 
no  other  private  letters,  and  then  tore  off  the  other  blank  page,  so 
as  to  send  you  a  double  letter  instead  of  only  half  a  sheet  from 
myself,  as  I  thought  it  would  be  no  more  postage  than  if  I  had  sent 
the  other  half  of  Ferguson's,  which  had  nothing  but  your  address 
on  it. 

"  You  will  have  heard  again  of  this  change  in  the  ministry,  and 
Peel  in.  Is  it  not  a  great  pity?  What  do  you  think  of  matters 
now  ? 

"  J.  W.  alludes  to  the  sleighing.  I  only  went  as  far  as  from  this 
to  Maria's,  and  then  got  out.  As  there  are  so  many  accidents,  I  do 
not  think  it  safe,  and  I  do  not  intend  to  get  into  one  again,  I  am  so 
likely  to  fall  getting  out.  One  omnibus  sleigh  yesterday  took  down 
120  people  and  brought  up  200,  with  a  band  of  music  and  r6 
horses  ;  all  respectable  people,  men  and  women,  of  whom  20  fell 
off  at  one  jolt,  that  were  hanging  on  the  outskirts,  like  so  many  flies 
stuck  on  all  over.  Eight  and  ten  horses  are  quite  common.  It  is 
a  most  gay  and  amusing  scene.  Cassie  Hone  and  Carrie  How- 
land  helped  to  make  up  a  party  of  25  who  went  out  in  an  omni- 
bus with  4  horses  ;   12  ladies   and   12   gentlemen,  with  an  elderly 


190  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

married  woman  to  matronize  them.  The  furs  in  the  sleigh  that 
Foster  gave  are  the  white  polar-bear  skins,  with  the  head  and 
all  complete,  and  cost  alone  $120.  I  was  invited  to  a  very  pleasant 
small  party  at  Mary  Van  Rensselaer's  last  week,  but  did  not  accept. 
Poor  Helen  and  Willie  were  all  dressed  on  Thursday  for  the  Hones' 
party,  and  waited  for  the  carriage  from  twelve  till  two,  when  I  had 
to  undress  them.  Poor  Helen  exclaimed  all  the  time,  with  tears  in 
her  eyes  :  '  No  more  tum,  no  party  !  '  Maria  thought  the  carriage 
would  be  unsafe,  and,  as  she  had  no  sleigh,  she  thought  I  would  not 
expect  to  be  sent  for,  and  she  is  such  a  coward  that  she  would  not 
trust  them  in  a  hack  sleigh.  The  party  was  elegant,  and  Uncle 
Philip  Hone  said  if  he  had  only  known  of  their  being  ready  he 
would  have  gone  for  them  and  carried  Helen  in  his  arms  himself. 
They  looked  so  sweet  that  it  was  a  great  disappointment  to  me 
also.  I  spent  all  Friday  morning  and  part  of  Saturday  with  Maria 
at  Anna  Winthrop's.  Maria's  attention  and  kindness  have  been  most 
touching,  and  Anna  seems  to  feel  it  greatly.  She  was  up  yesterday 
and  dressed.  God  bless  you,  my  own  loved  Will,  and  restore  us  to 
each  other  sooner  if  it  be  his  will,  and  give   me  patience  to  submit 

and  wait. 

"  Your  poor,  foolishly  affectionate 

"  H.  W." 

"New  Orleans,  January  27,  1846. 
"  My  Blessed  \Vife  : 

"Your  dear  letter  of  i3th-i5th  inst.  reached  me  this  morning, 
covering  my  dear  Charlotte's  sweet  letter  of  December  24.  The 
idea  of  the  contrast  of  your  hair  and  nightcap  ceasing  is  very  good, 
and  at  this  present  moment  Murray  T.  is  laughing  at  it.  I  see  you 
could  stand  my  going  once  to  Liverpool,  if  we  were  to  live  afterward 
permanently  in  New  York,  and  I  was  not  to  go  away  again.  When 
I  heard  of  the  probable  repeal  of  the  Corn  Laws,  and  the  accession  of 
the  Whigs  to  ofifice,  I  was  all  on  tiptoe  for  an  immediate  return  to 
England,  bag  and  baggage.  I  wanted  to  have  a  hand  in  the  political 
fray  which  is  pretty  sure  to  be  waged  during  the  next  twelve  months. 

"  To-night,  after  reading  the  Liverpool  Jotirnal  and  all  about  the 
miserable  local  politics  there,  about  which  I  used  to  be  so  much  in- 
terested, I  took  quite  a  '  scunner  '  at  the  place,  which  has  been  aggra- 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1 846.        I9I 

vated  by  a  second  perusal  of  your  dear  letter,  about  walking  through 
Washington  and  Union  squares  with  Maria  and  Emily,  and  having 
my  dear  little  bottle-nosed  seal  of  a  Willie  gamboling  before  you. 
This  picture  seemed  so  much  more  agreeable  than  anything  that 
Liverpool  can  offer,  with  fat  Mrs.  Haywood,  ugly  Mrs.  King,  and 
gossiping  Mrs.  Macviccar,  that  I  am  mightily  inclined  to  put  patriot- 
ism in  my  pocket  and  declare  that  *  thy  people  shall  be  my  people.' 
On  the  other  hand,  there  are  many  inducements  to  go  home,  and  on 
the  whole  I  never  was  so  undecided  in  my  life.  I  hope  God  will 
direct  us  what  to  do,  and  make  us  contented,  whatever  happens.  I 
should  like  to  know  how  you  continue  to  like  Dr.  Hutton.  I  hope, 
since  it  does  not  bore  you,  that  you  will  write  to  me  twice  a  week, 
sending  off  your  letters  on  Thursday  and  Monday  mornings.  The 
latter  will  inclose  one  from  John  Walter  or  Charlotte.  Do  you 
know,  I  have  a  considerable  mind  to  take  a  trip  to  Texas  while  I  am 
down  here.  I  thought  of  this  on  my  way  South,  but  gave  it  up  be- 
cause it  was  not  finally  annexed  to  the  United  States,  and  my  life 
policy  only  protects  me  in  the  United  States  and  British  America. 
Consequently,  if  1  should  '  shuffle  off  this  mortal  coil '  in  Texas,  it 
might  be  a  question  even  now  whether  it  is  so  fully  annexed  to 
the  United  States  as  to  be  considered  one  of  them,  and  conse- 
quently whether  or  not  the  sum  insured  on  my  life  would  be  payable 
on  my  death  there.  If  I  should  decide  to  go,  I  won't  go  for  a  week 
or  ten  days  yet,  and  most  likely  I  won't  go  at  all,  but  I  think  Galves- 
ton is  going  to  be  a  place  of  great  trade,  and  by  looking  after  it  soon 
we  might  come  in  for  a  good  share  of  it.  There  are  three  fine 
steamers  run  from  this  weekly  to  Galveston,  and  I  might  go  and 
return  in  ten  days.  The  distance  from  here  is  about  450  miles, 
TOO  of  which  are  on  the  Mississippi  ;  that  is,  Galveston  is  about  350 
miles  from  the  Southwest  Pass,  and  if  the  weather  kept  good,  the 
sail  might  be  pleasant  enough. 

"  The  great  fancy  ball  came  off  at  Mr.  Ledoux's  last  night.  Mylne 
and  Murray  T.  were  both  there  ;  the  latter  did  not  get  home  till 
three  this  morning,  and  some  people  did  not  leave  Ledoux's  till  after 
breakfast,  at  eight  this  morning.  Mrs.  Nicholson  was  there,  beauti- 
fully dressed,  Murray  and  Mylne  said,  as  a  sultana  !  Murray,  by 
the  way,  desires  to  be  kindly  remembered  to  you. 

"  I  was  introduced  to-day  to  a  Captain  Houston,  whose  wife  wrote 


192  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

a  book  called  'A  Yacht  Voyage  to  Texas.'  She  and  her  husband  are 
both  English.  Good-night.  God  bless  you.  Don't  bother  yourself 
about  Texas,  as  I  don't  think  it  likely  I  will  go,  and  if  I  do,  God  will 
take  care  of  me.  I  inclose  a  letter  from  Eliza  dated  at  Paris 
December  8,  and  received  by  me  to-day. 

"  January  28,  1846.  Whom  do  you  think  I  found  in  the  office 
this  morning  when  I  came  in?  The  Rev.  Mr.  Spencer  and  his  white 
cravat.  He  and  Mrs.  S.  and  young  James  Heyworth  arrived  this 
morning  from  Mobile,  having  traveled  right  through  from  Charleston 
in  six  days.  It  seems  they  were  in  Philadelphia  when  John  Walter 
was  there,  and  went  to  call,  but  were  told  he  had  the  smallpox.  Mrs. 
Spencer  has  stood  the  journey  very  well,  and  young  Heyworth  has 
got  as  fat  as  a  pig.  They  are  only  to  be  here  a  few  days.  I 
went  after  dinner  to  their  hotel  (the  Verandah),  which  is  a  very 
nice  and  cheerful  one,  opposite  the  St.  Charles,  and  took  them  all  up 
to  Lafayette  Square,  then  down  to  the  Levee  and  along  the  river  to 
the  '  Place  '  and  the  market,  and  then  up  Orleans  Street  to  the  Palm 
Tree,  then  along  Chartres  Street  and  into  our  house,  and  then  home 
to  the  Verandah,  and  if  I  have  time  to-morrow,  I  shall  give  them  an- 
other cruise.  Mr.  Spencer  said  that  his  wife  asserted  that  they  had 
never  met  anyone  in  America  who  took  them  such  good  walks  as 
Mr.  Wood.  They  want  me  to  go  up  the  river  with  them  to  St.  Louis. 
I  wish  I  could  on  my  way  home.  If  I  could  have  made  it  conven- 
ient to  go  to  Texas  by  the  steamer  to-morrow,  I  think  I  could  have 
induced  them  to  go  with  me. 

"  I  met  Heath  to-night  on  'Change.  He  was  one  of  the  two  gen- 
tlemen who  went  on  board  the  Wabash  Valley  with  us,  and  then  left 
it.  He  said  :  '  Have  you  ever  seen  the  Judge  ?  '  I  laughed  and  said  : 
'  No.  Has  he  got  his  spectacles  mended  ? '  whereat  he  laughed  and  said 
nothing,  so  that  story  is  known  here,  which  is  a  pity.  Did  I  tell  you 
I  lost  one  of  the  nice  cravats  Fanny  Dennistoun  gave  me  on  the  way 
here  ?  I  have  got  a  very  nice  scarf  made  into  two  cravats  by  Mme. 
Theodore  Rich,  black  satin  with  a  blue  pattern.  The  two  cost  me 
together  six  dollars,  which  is  not  dear  for  this  place.  Good-night, 
my  dearest.     God  bless  you  and  me  and  our  dear  children. 

"January  29,  1846.  The  mail  has  failed  beyond  Charleston  this 
morning,  consequently  the  steamer  letters  are  not  yet  to  hand.  This 
is   a  beautiful   day,  and    I   am  going  at  eleven   o'clock  to  take  the 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1 846.        I93 

Spencers  to  see  the  cemetery  (French).  I  see  that  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Davis  (Miss  Duncan  that  was)  have  arrived  at  the  Verandah  Hotel 
from  Natchez.  Sellar  has  not  yet  arrived  here.  With  love  to  all 
the  dear  children.  Oh  !  how  1  should  like  to  kiss  little  fat  Lady 
Helen,  and  Willie  and  Harrie  and  Bessie,  and,  indeed,  all  of  them. 
"  Ever  thine  own  attached  "  Wm.  W." 

"New  York,  January  28,  1846. 
"  My  Beloved  William  : 

"  I  have  tried  to  imitate  your  writing  in  '  New  York  '  and  your 
flourish  in  '  No.  10,'  but  it  is  no  go  ! 

"  I  dispatched  No.  9  to  you  on  26th  inst.  About  dinner  time  that 
day  No.  25  from  you  made  its  appearance,  dated  14th  and  15th 
inst.,  and  to-day,  about  3  p.  M.,  I  received  No.  26  of  i6th  and  19th 
inst.  By  the  way,  this  numbering  of  letters  is  always  a  reproach  to 
me,  you  dear  one,  No.  10  and  No.  26  being  so  great  a  contrast,  but 
I  repeat  again  it  was  all  your  oivn  fault.  Did  I  not  say  to  you  over 
and  over  again  before  you  Avent  away  :  '  Dear,  when  shall  I  write  to 
you  ?  Dear,  where  shall  I  direct  my  letters  at  first  before  you  get 
to  New  Orleans  ? '  Your  answer  always  was  the  same  :  *  Write  first 
on  Friday  to  Washington,  then  to  Charleston,  and  after  that  I  will 
let  you  know  where  and  wheti  to  write  ;  but  you  must  write  once  a 
week,  and  the  children  once,  making  twice.  Since  you  reached  New 
Orleans  I  have  never  failed,  and  have  always  written  regularly, 
though  I  have  not  always  given  you  a  whole  letter  when  I  wanted 
to,  you  may  be  sure,  by  my  writing  in  such  a  close,  cramped  hand 
in  order  to  contain  all  I  wanted  to  say  in  a  small  space.  Yours  of 
i6th  inst.  troubled  me  a  good  deal — that  I  had  not  written  every 
day  after  you  knew  of  Johnnie's  illness.  Then,  I  confess,  I  might 
have  departed  from  the  regular  course,  but  I  did  not  think  you 
would  have  been  anxious  after  liearing  he  was  recovering.  I  shall 
be  glad  when  you  get  rid  of  all  slave  dealing,  though  I  think  perhaps 
you  acted  wisely  in  permitting  the  purchase  by  Dr.  Seip  under 
the  peculiar  circumstances.  I  hope  you  will  not  need  to  go  to 
Hollywood,  for  I  think  the  less  you  are  on  these  dangerous  Missis- 
sippi boats  the  better.  The  next  thing  worthy  of  notice  in  your 
dear  letters  is  the  precious  words  of  comfort  concerning  your 
return    on   March    15  or  20,  say   15  poz.     I   will  not  think  of  the 


194  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

2oth  at  all,  for  when  the  15th  comes,  if  you  can't  help  it  then,  I 
can  bear  five  days  more  ;  but  at  present  the  days  go  so  slowly  that 
I  sometimes  feel  as  if  it  were  impossible  for  me  to  wait.  Now,  this 
reduces  my  list  of  days,  which  take  so  short  a  time  to  knock  off  and 
so  long  to  pass  to  forty-five  days,  sixty-three  having  passed  away  this 
evening.  I  shall  keep  a  good  lookout  for  the  February  4  steamer, 
and  may  God  send  her  a  quick  and  safe  voyage  ! 

"  I  was  much  touched  by  your  remarks  on  the  progress  of  religion 
in  Louisiana  ;  they  were  so  like  your  own  precious  self  and  your 
better  self.  I  suppose  '  the  best  dressed  gentleman  in  Liverpool ' 
was  nuts  to  you  ?  That  would  be  like  your  less  noble  self,  but  very 
like  you,  too.  No.  26  tells  of  the  finding  of  your  keys  and  the 
damage  paid  ;  this  last,  however,  was  less  than  the  annoyance  of 
having  all  the  good  locks  picked.  The  thank-offering  was  well 
under  any  circumstances.  Your  Thanksgiving  sermon  was  some- 
thing of  the  nature  of  ours  in  New  York — '  Jonathan '  will  brag 
a  little  of  his  *  instit^c'tions.'  I  see  that  you  cannot  help  harping  upon 
the  old  string  regarding  our  stay  in  America  or  exodus  in  August. 
I  must  say  my  own  mind  is  as  undecided  as  your  own  about  the 
advantages  or  disadvantages.  I  am  by  no  means  sure  that  educa- 
tion for  J.  Walter  is  better  here  than  at  home,  and  certainly,  if  he 
is  to  be  a  barrister,  England  is  the  place  for  him.  An  American 
lawyer  is  nothing  without  great  eminence. 

"  '  Eothen  '  has  not  arrived,  but  the  newspaper  has,  and  I  have 
read  the  article  upon  Dr.  Scott.  Poor  fellow  !  no  doubt  he  has 
suffered  severely  for  having  let  loose  the  reins  of  his  tongue  a  little. 
Let  it  be  a  warning  to  us  as  Christians,  dear  William,  to  keep  a 
bridle  always  on  that  unruly  member. 

**  I  wanted  to  read  'Eothen,'  as  Warburton,  in  '  The  Crescent  and 
the  Cross,'  alludes  to  it  so  frequently.  I  have  been  a  long  time 
completing  that  work,  but  have  got  through  it  at  last.  I  have  been 
reading  regularly  through  the  British  Quarterly  for  August  and  No- 
vember. Most  of  the  articles  are  excellent.  Carlyle  is  cut  up  as  I 
think  he  deserves  ;  he  is  no  favorite  of  mine.  Your  reading  '  Oliver 
Cromwell  '  and  the  newspapers  on  Sunday  was  a  dangerous  experi- 
ment. It  is  easier  to  let  the  devil  in  than  to  put  him  out,  but  I 
agree  with  you  that  reading  a  rational,  sober  book  was  better  than 
idle  thoughts.     But  the  newspapers  lead   the  mind   so  completely 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1846.        I95 

into  the  everyday  business  of  life  that  they  are  better  avoided.  I 
wish  I  had  you  home  again,  when  we  might  join  in  singing  hymns 
when  tired  of  reading,  or  have  religious  conversation. 

"  The  doctor  sent  in  an  account  of  eight  dollars  for  John  Walter, 
so  Mrs.  Kane  sent  me  back  the  two  dollars.  Maria  was  here  to- 
day when  your  twenty-sixth  letter  arrived  ;  she  was  just  going, 
when  she  got  sight  of  it,  and  sat  down,  saying,  as  a  matter  of 
course  :  *  Come,  let  us  hear  it.'  '  Oh,'  said  I,  '  I  had  better  read  it  to 
myself  first.'  But,  finding  her  impatient,  I  just  glanced  my  eye  from 
sentence  to  sentence,  and  read  to  her  as  I  went  on.  She  was 
delighted  with  your  letter,  but  said  about  Cromwell  :  '  I  do  think,  for 
a  clear-headed,  sound-thinking  man,  William  has  some  of  the 
queerest  notions  I  ever  knew.'  At  your  description  of  Sunday  she 
observed  :  '  That's  his  mother's  view — the  influence  of  early  educa- 
tion.' She  was  pretty  sure  that  Mr.  De  P.  knew  no  one  in  Santa 
Cruz,  but  she  would  ask  him.  Muller's  mother  lives  there,  but 
she  says  she  is  only  a  poor  widow,  and  could  only  give  T.  Sellar 
a  dinner,  and  that  would  do  him  no  good  and  would  bother  her.  I 
have  told  J.  Walter  to  hurry  with  his  lessons  and  go  up  there  and 
see  if  Mr.  De  P.  has  a  letter  and  bring  it  down  for  me  to  inclose 
to  you. 

"  Willie  has  just  gone  to  bed  in  great  sorrow  because  someone 
had  unwound  his  worsteds  and  left  them  all  in  '  snugs  ' — by  snugs 
I  find  he  means  all  entangled.  Our  nursery  carpet  has  been  put 
down  to-day  (we  had  only  a  drugget  on  before,  till  we  saw  how  the 
chimneys  went  on).  It  is  not  a  new  but  a  very  nice  one,  and  Willie 
had  been  collecting  all  the  ravelings  from  it  and  knotting  them  into 
one  long  string,  and  winding  it  upon  a  ball  for  thread.  You  ask 
again  about  Harriet  :  she  can  now  read  very  well,  and  yesterday 
they  took  their  places  in  the  classes,  which  they  do  every  six  weeks, 
when  they  take  places  according  as  they  have  done  well  for  each 
week,  shown  by  the  number  of  marks  for  perfect  lessons  and  for 
imperfect.  Harrie  has  been  the  best,  and  took  the  head  this  time. 
Her  class  consists  of  four,  including  herself.  Charlotte  is  No.  7 
in  a  class  of  twenty-five,  and  would  have  been  higher  had  she  not 
been  absent,  owing  to  her  sore  throat,  in  the  wet  weather.  All  the 
girls  in  the  class  are  older  than  herself  except  four  of  her  own  age. 
Bessie  is  No.  3  in  a  class  of  thirteen. 


196  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

"  Captain  Comstock  came  in  to  ask  if  the  chimney  had  smoked. 
Helen  shook  her  little  head  and  said  :  '  No  more,  old  marn,'  mean- 
ing 'old  man.'  This  he  of  course  did  not  understand,  but  Harrie 
went  up  to  him  and  said  :  '  You  mustn't  mind  her  calling  you  an  old 
man,  for  she  calls  her  mother  old  man,  too.'  She  is  much  less  fret- 
ful than  she  was,  and  looks  very  pretty.  Bessie  is  as  industrious  as 
she  can  be — always  reading  or  doing  something  useful.  She  is  deep 
in  the  Picayune  now.  I  went  with  Maria  to  see  Anna  to-day,  who 
is  slowly  recovering.  Then  I  went  on  foot  for  a  walk  to  see  C. 
Neilson,  whose  baby  has  grown  quite  fat  ;  then  to  see  Anna  Rus- 
sell, and  to  beg  off  from  coming  to  spend  the  day  there  on  Satur- 
day. I  met  the  Morrises  there,  who  said  their  mother  "had  such  a 
pleasant  visit  at  our  house  last  week.  Did  I  tell  about  Aunt 
Morris  coming  in  about  dusk  and  sitting  so  long  with  us  ?  I  found 
Anna  Russell  looking  very  feeble,  and  I  think  our  not  coming  was  a 
relief  to  her  as  well  as  to  me.  I  told  her  that  by  the  time  I  was 
dressed  for  going  out  I  was  more  fit  for  my  bed,  which  is  a  fact  ;  but 
as  she  said  her  children  expected  Willie  and  Helen  to  dine  with 
them  at  one,  I  promised  to  let  them  go  from  twelve  till  three  on 
Saturday.  On  Friday  we  all  dine  with  Maria,  and  on  Monday 
evening  she  gives  her  little  party  for  Charlotte.  Mary  Parkin  ran 
after  me  in  Eleventh  Street  to-day,  and  we  had  a  pleasant  walk 
together.  God  bless  you,  my  own  loved  Will !  Only  forty-six  days 
more  !  Harriet  Mills  and  Brodhead  send  you  their  love.  Re- 
member me  to  Sellar,  Mylne,  and  Murray. 

"  Faithfully  your  own  "  H." 

"  To-morrow  I  shall  write  to  Mary  Ferguson.  Mr.  De  Peyster 
says  that  fifteen  years  ago  he  used  to  know  many  Santa  Cruz  peo- 
ple, but  now  not  a  soul  but  Muller's  mother  ;  he  is  very  sorry  and 
sends  you  his  best  love,  and  so  do  Maria  and  Em.  Once  more  fare- 
well, mine  own  loved  Will. 

"  Your  own  "  H.  W." 

"  New  Orleans,  January  31,  1846. 
**  My  Darling  Harriet  : 

"Your  short  scolding  letter  of  Sunday,  January  18,  arrived  yes- 
terday, covering  one  of  Saturday,  17th,  from  Charlotte.  Yours  gave 
me  a  scolding  about  something  I  had  written  in  No.  23.     I  have  no 


CORRESPONDENCE  CONTINUED — WINTER  OF  1 846.    1 97 

recollection  of  it — something,  I  suppose,  contrary  to  the  Blue  Laws  of 
Connecticut,  which  made  it  a  crime  for  a  man  to  kiss  his  wife  on 
Sunday.  I  have  referred  to  my  journal,  but  it  throws  no  light  on  the 
subject  matter  of  the  letter  in  question,  but  it  was  something  naughty, 
I  suppose,  so  I  stand  rebuked,  you  dear  little  Diana  of  Ephesus, 
*  chaste  as  the  icicle  that  hangs  on  Dian's  temple.'  God  bless  you  ; 
but  '  I  do  love  you,  dear  Harriet  ;  I  must  tell  you  so.'  And  so  you 
did  not  think  young  Don  Juan  any  better,  or,  indeed,  I  hope  not  quite 
as  good  as  old  Don  William  ?  It  is  odd  that  Mrs.  Spencer's  idea  of 
pleasing  you  was  to  say  that  you  resembled  an  Englishwoman,  while 
your  countryman  Juan  Rowland  meant  no  compliment  by  the  com- 
parison. Now  /  think  that  whatever  is  lovely  and  pleasant  in  the 
American  and  English  woman  Nature  culled  to  combine  in  Harriet 
Kane  ;  rejectingt  he  weeds  of  either  garden  (if  the  American  women, 
G(;d  bless  them,  have  any  weeds),  she  has  in  you  selected  the  flowers  of 
both.  Now,  '  say  something,  Mrs.  Wood,  say  something.'  My  dear 
little  Charlotte's  letter  amused  me  ;  the  dear  child  is  too  witty  this  last 
time, — in  fact,  the  wit  lies  so  deep  that  one  can  hardly  reach  it, — but  I 
am  delighted  to  see  she  is  in  good  spirits  and  doing  her  best  to  be 
wise  as  well  as  witty.  The  writing  was  but  so-so  ;  indeed,  so  '  so-so  ' 
that  I  read  the  first  half  of  the  first  page  before  I  found  out  that  it 
was  not  from  J.  Walter,  but  only  discovered  that  it  was  Charlotte's 
from  the  style.  I  could  not  see  the  wit  of  Harrie's  remark  about  the 
Lord  Mayor's  day,  although  Charlotte  professes  to  do  so,  but  she  has 
a  particularly  keen  eye  for  detecting  wit  where  it  might  be  hidden 
from  the  obscure  paternal  vision.  However,  to  be  serious,  tell 
Charlotte  that,  although  her  letter  is  very  legibly  and  distinctly  writ- 
ten, it  is  more  like  a  man's  hand  than  a  lady's,  and  she  seems  to 
change  her  handwriting  constantly.  I  wish  she  would  choose  her 
prettiest  style,  and  stick  to  it.  Dear  children,  how  I  would  like  to 
see  them  all  and  hear  little  '  Bebee '  Helen  utter  her  '  native 
wood-notes  wild.'  I  certainly  never  took  the  good  of  my  children 
when  I  had  them  beside  me,  or  can  it  be  that  'distance  lends  enchant- 
ment to  the  view  '  ?  By  the  way,  tell  John  Walter  that  his  friend 
Denegre's  brother  was  in  the  office  on  business  a  few  days  ago,  and 
tells  me  that  his  brother  is  in  Benjamin  &  Mecon's  office  studying 
law,  Benjamin*  being  the  man  who  bought  Belle  Chasse  from  us. 

*  Subsequently  United  States  Senator,  and  then  Confederate  Secretary  of  War, 
and  finally  a  leading  barrister  in  London. 


198  -AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  Tom  Sellar  returned  the  day  I  closed  my  last  letter  to  you 
(29th  inst.),  and  will  probably  leave  this  again  for  St.  James  Parish 
and  Attakapas  on  Monday  or  Tuesday,  February  2.  I  shall  not  be 
surprised  if  I  reach  New  York  before  him,  as  he  has  it  in  view  to 
return  by  way  of  Cuba,  Porto  Rico,  etc.,  as  I  believe  I  told  you 
before  and  also  told  you  not  to  tell  anyone. 

"  Dr.  Spencer  is  full  of  abhorrence  of  the  slave  system  and  of  con- 
tempt for  slaveholders,  and  most  particularly  abhors,  despises,  and 
detests  ministers  who  do  anything  to  palliate  slavery,  or  who  are 
themselves  slaveholders.  He  says  if  any  crime  would,  in  his  opinion, 
more  particularly  than  another,  call  for  the  vengeance  of  the 
Almighty,  and  the  death  of  the  perpetrator,  it  is  the  crime  of  one 
man  presuming  to  sell  another.  There  is  no  doubt  that  the  system 
of  slavery  is  a  horrible  one,  and  that  the  sooner  it  is  abolished  the 
better,  but  I  think  Dr.  Spencer  is  perhaps  rather  extreme  in  his 
opinions  about  it,  although  I  don't  know.  Possibly  I  may  not  have 
that  utter  hatred  and  detestation  of  it  which  I  ought  to  have.  I 
conscientiously  believe  that  the  negroes  are  an  inferior  race,  and 
therefore  I  don't  think  they  feel  their  chains  so  galling  as  a  white 
man  would  do,  but  that  is  no  reason  for  making  them  slaves  or  keep- 
ing them  in  slavery. 

"  I  have  quite  given  up  the  notion  of  going  to  Texas.  I  have 
made  sacrifices  enough  for  the  business,  and  I  feel  much  inclined  to 
give  up  '  kicking  against  the  pricks,'  and  just  let  things  'gang  their 
ain  gait.'  If  other  people  won't  put  their  shoulders  to  the  wheel, 
there  is  no  use  in  my  fretting  further.  If  we  are  all  spared,  I  think 
(G.  W.)  we  will  just  go  home  to  England,  and  let  matters  rub  on  as 
well  as  they  can  ;  and  if  we  can  get  food  and  raiment,  and  educa- 
tion for  our  children,  endeavor  to  be  therewith  content.  However, 
although  I  am  '  disgoost  '  in  some  respects,  yet  this  very  day  has 
shown  my  visit  to  New  Orleans  has  not  been  without  some  use,  for 
we  got  $1200  from  one  debtor,  and  $750  from  another,  which  I  con- 
sider as  so  much  out  of  the  fire,  although  they  are  but  drops  in  the 
bucket. 

"  I  think  I  have  now  fairly  decided  to  return  to  Liverpool  as  far 
as  a  poor  human  can  decide,  and  I  won't  back  and  fill  any  more 
about  the  matter,  so  I  hope  you  and  the  children  will  get  your  minds 
*  in  a  concatenation   accordingly.'     This  will  be  good  news  to  my 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1846.        I99 

dear,  round-faced,  smiling  Bessie.  I  hope  she  won't  laugh  on  the 
wrong  side  of  her  mouth  when  she  gets  there  !  I  think  the  Spencers 
and  '  Cub  '  Heyworth  will  go  up  the  river  Tuesday,  February  3,  in 
the  fine  new  steamer  Peytona  j  she  is  a  splendid  boat,  quite  new,  and 
her  accommodations  beat  those  of  the  Sultana.  The  staterooms 
are  larger,  and  those  in  the  ladies'  cabin  have  each  a  wardrobe  for 
hanging  up  dresses,  and  there  are  nice  washstands,  looking-glasses, 
etc.  Yesterday  the  weather  was  excessively  hot,  I  suppose  about 
80°  in  the  shade  ;  to-day  it  is  clear  and  cool,  and  a  fire  is  quite 
pleasant.  I  called  with  Dr.  Spencer  on  Dr.  Hawks,  hoping  the 
latter  would  ask  him  to  preach,  but  Dr.  Hawks  was  not  at  home, 
and  I  have  not  heard  whether  he  has  returned  Spencer's  call.  I 
should  like  to  hear  Spencer  again.  Who  do  you  think  met  me  close 
to  the  office  to-day  but  that  vulgar  little  Kirkpatrick  that  sits  in  Mr. 
Kelly's  church  at  home  in  Liverpool.  I  saw  him,  you  know,  in 
New  York.  By  the  way,  if  you  feel  in  the  humor,  I  W\%\vyou  would 
reply  to  Dr.  Blackburn's  last  letter  ;  I  really  can't  be  bothered  writing 
except  to  you  or  on  business.  I  am  sorry  to  hear  that  you  are  still 
troubled  with  smoky  rooms.  If  you  should  change,  I  hope  you  will 
be  able  to  get  equally  convenient  rooms  in  some  other  part  of  the 
house,  at  the  same  price  if  possible  ;  but  if  you  can't  get  them  at  the 
same  price,  you  must  have  them  'anyhow.'  Perhaps  some  of  the 
present  occupiers  of  rooms  on  the  first  story  may  be  vacating  them 
early  in  spring.  You  should  tell  Comstock  to  let  you  have  the  offer 
of  the  first  good  suite  of  rooms  that  is  vacant.  And,  by  the  way,  if 
I  should  manage  to  get  home  by  the  middle  of  March,  we  will  need 
an  additional  room  then  instead  of  on  April  i. 

"  I  am  sitting  here  by  myself  in  the  dining  room,  and  it  is  now 
9  p.  M.  Sellar  dines  with  us  daily  when  here.  I  have  little  to 
do,  as  the  steamer's  letters  have  not  yet  arrived,  and  my  work  is  done 
as  far  as  I  can  do  it  ;  I  am  waiting  for  other  people  to  do  theirs,  and 
feel  in  rather  a  discontented  and  fretful  humor — in  short,  'sinfully 
dogged  and  snappish,'  as  you  have  no  doubt  found  out  by  the  tenor 
of  this  epistle,  so  I  will  go  and  sleep  it  off,  and  hoj^e  to-morrow, 
being  Sunday,  I  may  rest  from  my  evil  thoughts  and  worldly  imagi- 
nations. Good-night  ;  God  bless  you  and  me  And  our  dear  children. 
I  have  just  been  reading  the  account  of  the  battle  of  Dunbar  in 
'  Cromwell's  Life,'  fought  opposite  Elie  ;  this  put  me  in  mind  of  the 


200  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

happy  summer  we  spent  there  in  1842,  and  of  you  and  me  sitting  on 
these  rocks,  and  the  fine  clear  waves  rolling  in  at  our  feet.  *  Dost 
thou  remember,  love  ? '  Yes,  we  will  go  home,  and  hope  that  God 
may  give  us  a  competency,  and  enable  us  in  our  old  age  to  return  to 
Fife,  and  at  last  lay  our  bones  in  the  old  churchyard  at  Elie,  where 
*  the  rude  forefathers  of  the  hamlet  sleep.'  Good-night  again,  you 
dear,  dear  sweet  wife. 

"  Sunday  February  i,  1846.  I  hope,  if  God  spare  us,  dearest, 
that  we  shall  meet  in  health  and  happiness  next  month.  This  has 
been  a  beautiful  day,  clear  as  crystal,  with  a  fine,  cool,  bracing 
breeze.  The  steamer's  news  have  not  yet  arrived.  Tom  Sellar 
went  up  this  morning  by  the  Belle  Creole  steamer  to  the  parish  of 
St.  James,  and  after  being  there  a  few  days  intends  to  return  here 
and  go  to  Pelton's,  and  with  him  upon  an  excursion  to  Attakapas. 
I  would  like  very  much  to  go  with  them.  Tom  Sellar  likes  the 
Southern  planters  and  their  hospitable  ways  very  much,  and  says  he 
has  seen  more  of  America  the  month  he  has  been  in  Lafourche  and 
Terrebonne  than  he  has  ever  seen  before.  I  gave  him  a  scolding 
for  going  off  on  Sunday,  but  he  did  so  in  order  to  try  and  be  back 
again  in  time  for  the  boat,  which  only  goes  once  a  week  to  Grand 
Caillou.  After  seeing  him  off  this  glorious  bright  morning  I  took  a 
stroll  up  the  Levee,  and  then  home,  and  then  to  church.  I  saw  the 
Spencers  at  a  distance  going  to  Dr.  Hawks'  with  Helen  Nicholson. 
I  heard  a  very  good  sermon  from  Dr.  Scott  on  the  text  '  The 
Sabbath  was  made  for  man.'  After  I  came  out  I  walked  up  Canal 
Street  till  I  was  stopped  by  a  ditch,  which  was  too  wide  to  run  the 
risk  of  jumping  across,  so  I  turned  back  and  went  through  the 
cemeteries,  away  through  quiet  streets  till  I  came  to  the  railway, 
then  down  to  the  river  and  along  the  Levee  home,  where  I  saw  the 
table  laid  for  six.  I  went  to  my  own  room  and  dressed,  and  then 
read  Goode's  '  Better  Covenant '  for  half  an  hour,  till  I  was  called  to 
dinner,  where  I  found  the  British  Consul,  Mr.  Leech,  and  Joshua 
Dixon,  a  nephew  of  your  friend  Tom  Dixon.  We  had  a  good  deal 
of  talk  about. preaching,  etc.  They  went  away  at  7  p.  m.,  and  I  went 
to  Dr.  Scott's  and  heard  a  stranger.  The  last  hymn  was  :  '  Come,  ye 
disconsolate,'  sung  to  poor  dear  dead  Charlotte's  tune.  How 
vividly  it  brought  the  'sweet  thing'  to  my  recollection  ;  she  has 
found  that   '  earth  has  no  sorrows  that   Heaven  cannot  cure.'      I 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1 846.        20I 

wonder  if  she  still  passes  herself  off  as  '  Mrs.  Wood's  sister  '  ?  Good- 
night, my  beloved  ;  blessings  on  you  and  my  dear  children  ;  may  God 
be  with  us  all  ! 

"  Monday,  February  2,  1846.  No  steamer  news,  the  mail  having 
as  usual  failed  beyond  Richmond,  probably  owing  to  snow,  so  here 
we  are  kept  day  by  day  on  the  tiptoe  of  expectation  for  the  most 
important  news  that  has  been  received  for  thirty  years,  and  can't 
get  it.  This  is  a  clear  cold  day  ;  no  doubt  you  have  snow  and  frost 
in  the  North.  Kiss  my  dear  Charlotte  for  me,  and  don't  let  my 
laughing  at  her  witty  attempts  discourage  her. 

"  Ever  thine  own  attached 

"Wm.W." 

"  New  Orleans,  February  3,  1846. 
"  Mv  Own  Sweet  Love  : 

"  I  have  your  delightful,  cheerful  letter  giving  me  an  account  of 
all  your  bother  and  annoyance  with  the  awful  smoky  chimneys,  writ- 
ten January  21-22,  but  concluding  with  the  comfortable  assurance 
that  the  smoke  was  cured.  I  hope  it  may  be  so,  but  after  my  friends 
the  Whigs  being  turned  out  after  they  were  fairly  in,  and  Peel  in 
again  after  he  was  fairly  out,  I  can  be  sure  of  nothing  in  this  world. 
We  got  the  news  early  this  morning,  and  in  consequence  I  could 
not  eat  my  breakfast  with  relish.  However,  Peel  or  no  Peel,  the 
corn  laws  are  doomed  ;  that  is  one  comfort.  John  D.,  M.  P.  for 
Glasgow,  writes  me  from  London,  January  i,  that  no  man  knew 
what  Peel  would  really  do,  but  his  opinion  was  that  he  would  do  one 
of  two  things — either  abolish  the  corn  laws  entirely  as  soon  as  Par- 
liament met,  or  reduce  the  duty  to  five  shillings  per  quarter,  reduc- 
ing that  one  shilling  every  year,  until  at  the  end  of  five  years  it  was 
gone.  But  John  clings  to  the  hope  that  he  will  propose  total  and 
immediate  repeal,  and  carry  it.  There  had  been  an  immense  meet- 
ing in  Glasgow  on  December  11,  which  John  went  down  from 
London  to  attend.  Lord  John  Russell  was  to  be  there,  but  was 
summoned  by  the  Queen  to  London.  I  sincerely  wish  we  were 
all  in  England  at  present.  One  is  missing  golden  opportunities  of 
being  useful  in  the  cause  of  freedom,  to  say  nothing  of  making  a 
name  for  one's  self.  However,  I  suppose  my  fate  is  to  sneak  through 
life  to  an  unhonored  (I  hope  it  may  not  be  a  rt'/Vhonored)  grave.     I 


202  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD, 

wish  I  had  Hved  in  Cromwell's  time  ;  I  might  at  least  have  served 
against  the  '  malignants  '  !  might  possibly  have  signed  Charles  I. 's 
death  warrant,  and  have  had  the  honor  of  being  hanged  after  the 
restoration  of  that  unmitigated  scoundrel  Charles  II.  But,  my  dar- 
ling, I  willingly  forego  all  these  honors  and  privileges  on  reflecting 
that,  had  I  antedated  my  existence  by  two  hundred  years,  I  could 
not  have  been  your  husband,  and  the  father  of  my  six  fine  children  ; 
therefore  I  will  content  myself  with  existing  in  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, and  there  is  no  saying  but  that  I  may  live  to  be  hanged  or 
beheaded  yet  in  the  cause  of  civil  and  religious  liberty,  which  will 
be  a  pleasant  and  cheerful  thing  for  you  to  look  forward  to. 

"  I  see  Cobden  was  offered  the  vice-presidency  of  the  Board  of 
Trade  by  Lord  John  Russell,  which  he  declined.  The  Earl  of  Clar- 
endon, Mr.  Villiers'  brother,  was  to  have  been  president.  I  am  glad 
Cobden  did  decline  ;  he  ought  to  have  been  offered  the  presidency. 
I  am  afraid  Peel  will  not  have  pluck  enough  to  repeal  the  corn 
laws  at  once.  However,  I  am  not  without  hope  of  it,  and  probably 
the  steamer  which  leaves  Liverpool  to-morrow  will  bring  out  the 
good  news. 

"  Poor  Cross  had  been  ill  with  rheumatic  fever,  but  was  better, 
though  still  weak.  Anna  and  her  children  well.  I  hope  you  will  send 
me  on  all  the  letters  you  receive.  Murray  has  a  letter  from  Eleanor 
which  speaks  of  dear  Mary  having  been  very  ill,  and  poor  Ferguson 
thin  and  reduced,  and  having  to  turn  about  his  head  in  a  most  pain- 
ful way  when  he  spoke  to  anyone.  Robert  Dennistoun  was  with 
James  and  Eliza  in  Paris,  and  they  were  just  about  starting  for 
Marseilles,  eti  route  to  Rome. 

"  We  had  some  fifty-five  to  sixty  business  letters  to-day  by  the 
mail,  so  you  may  be  sure  I  have  had  an  exciting  day's  work  of  it 
with  them  and  the  newspapers.  Business  had  been  very  bad  in 
England,  but  was  likely  to  improve.  Cross  had  been  making  some 
large  sales  of  cotton  at  low  prices,  on  which  there  will  be  a  heavy 
loss,  and  Crawford  is  not  managing  the  dry-goods  business  properly, 
and,  on  the  whole,  I  seem  to  be  as  much  needed  at  home  as  I  am 
here,  yet  I  dread  the  idea  of  going  back.  Yet  why  should  we  fear  ? 
God  has  been  very  gracious  to  us  hitherto,  and  if  he  has  not  given 
us  wealth,  he  has  blessed  us  with  what  I  really  have  lived  to  be  able 
to  say  I  sincerely  think  a  thousand  times  better,  that  is,  sound  health 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — WINTER   OF    1 846.        203 

of  body  and  mind.  Let  us,  therefore,  trust  in  God  at  all  times,  not 
only  when  we  have  a  transient  gleam  of  prosperity,  but  when  the 
prospect  is  dark  and  gloomy,  ever  remembering  that  '  our  light  afflic- 
tions, which  are  but  for  a  moment,  work  out  for  us  a  far  more 
exceeding  and  eternal  weight  of  glory.' 

"  Your  description  of  my  dear  little  Harrie  going  to  bed  'laughing 
coyly  and  blushing  '  brought  the  darling  child  vividly  before  me. 
Kiss  her  for  me,  and  tell  her  to  try  her  hand  at  being  a  good  girl  for 
another  week  and  I  will  try  if  I  can  find  a  picayune  for  to  buy  candy 
one  of  these  days  when  the  corn  laws  are  repealed. 

"  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Spencer  and  James  Heyworth  went  off  in  the 
Peytona  this  evening  to  Louisville.  I  saw  the  Magnolia  to-day  ; 
another  splendid  new  boat.  Her  carpets  are  of  the  same  sort  and 
of  a  very  similar  pattern  to  our  drawing-room  one  at  Everton.  Only 
think  of  such  luxury  in  a  Mississippi  boat  !  Good-night,  dearest. 
God  bless  you  and  my  dear  children.  Pray  for  me  that  I  be  not  led 
into  temptation  about  business  or  anything  else,  and  pray  for  poor 
Mary  and  her  husband,  that  their  afflictions  maybe  blessed  to  them." 


CHAPTER  XL 

CORRESPONDENCE     CONTINUED     DURING     W.     W.'s    STAY     IN      NEW 
ORLEANS    IN    1846. 

"  Thursday,  February  5,  1846.  Your  delightful  letter  of  Sunday* 
January  25,  is  just  at  hand,  covering  one  from  John  Walter  and  one 
from  Ferguson.  At  the  same  time  a  very  clever,  cheerful  letter  from 
Tom  Kane,  which  I  shall  send  to  you  next  time  I  write.  Tom 
Sellar  is  here  to-day,  but  goes  off  again  immediately  to  Attakapas. 
He  is  strongly  of  opinion  that  I  should  remain  in  New  York,  at  any 
rate  for  another  year,  going  to  Liverpool  for  two  or  three  months  this 
summer.  I  really  know  not  what  to  think,  but  am  '  like  a  wave  of 
the  sea,  driven  with  the  wind  and  tossed.'  Pray  that  God  will  guide 
us.  I  long  to  be  with  you  and  not  to  be  separated  again.  I  am 
delighted  to  hear  such  good  accounts  of  the  behavior  of  all  my  dear 
children,  and  that  God  already  appears  to  be  touching  the  heart  of 
my  little  wayward  Harriet  and  little  Willie's.  I  wish  you  had  sent 
little  Willie  and  Helen  to  Philip  Hone's.  God  bless  and  watch  over 
us  and  them  and  keep  us  from  evil. 

"  Ever  thine  own  attached 

"  Wm.  W." 

"New  York,  February  4,  1846. 
"  AIy  Very  Dear  Husband  : 

"Don't  be  startled  and  say  *  No.  14  !  I  must  have  missed  two 
letters  ! '  for  I  am  anxious,  with  your  No.  28  staring  me  in  the  face,  to 
get  on  a  little  faster,  and  as  you  say  you  have  had  two  No.  4's  and  two 
No.  7's,  this  in  reality  must  be  No.  14.  Yours  of  January  28  reached 
me  to-day  at  dinner  time,  and  has  left  me  sad  and  dissatisfied,  for  I 
am  provoked  to  see  how  disappointed  you  have  been  about  my 
letters,  and  annoyed  to  think  of  their  being  delayed,  or  perhaps  hav- 
ing altogether  miscarried.  Regularly  as  clockwork  do  I  dispatch 
my  letter  on  Monday  morning,  or  late   on   Sunday  night,  and   how 

204 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — NEW    ORLEANS,    1 846.      20$ 

Dawson's  of  15th  inst.  arrived  without  mine  I  cannot  imagine. 
Dear,  dear  Will,  how  I  long  to  see  you  and  clasp  you  to  my  heart,  to 
tell  you  how  I  love  you  and  weep  out  all  my  sorrows  upon 
your  breast.  I  have  just  returned,  or  rather  returned  at  3.30  p.  m., 
from  a  morning  spent  with  my  beloved  Anna  Winthrop.  She 
was  in  bed  to-day,  and  with  a  nightcap  on  looked  doubly  as  ill 
as  before.  Mary  Parkin  was  there  all  the  time  and  made  me  laugh 
a  great  deal,  though  my  heart  was  sad.  Anna  listened  to  us  and 
occasionally  smiled,  but  did  not  speak  ;  she  is  much  alarmed  about 
herself,  and  the  doctor  told  Mary  this  morning  that  she  must  be 
kept  very  cheerful,  and  her  thoughts  off  herself  as  much  as  possible  ; 
that  when  she  felt  these  nervous  attacks  and  feelings  of  sinking,  she 
must  be  rallied  and  laughed  at,  so  as  to  make  them  of  less  frequent 
occurrence  ;  that  when  she  felt  them  coming  on,  her  apprehension 
made  them  worse.  He  says  the  pills  she  is  taking  are  nothing — she 
has  no  bile,  as  she  thinks,  nor  any  disease,  nor  can  medicine  reach 
her  case  ;  that  she  is  in  a  most  precarious  situation,  and  her  cough  is 
one  he  does  not  like — it  is  a  very  short,  husky  one.  The  doctor  told 
Charles,  and  also  Maria,  that  he  considered  her  situation  a  very 
critical  one.  To  both  he  said  her  constitution  seemed  to  be  worn 
out,  and  all  that  could  be  done  was  to  keep  her  composed  and 
cheerful,  and  to  give  her  as  much  of  everything  strengthening  and 
nourishing  as  she  could  bear.  Ever  since  her  illness  and  ever  since 
you  went  I  have  been  unfortunate  in  my  attempts  to  speak  to 
her  on  religious  subjects  ;  that  is,  I  have  said  a  little,  but  never 
drew  anything  satisfactory  from  her.  Well,  on  Monday,  the  day  of 
Maria's  party,  we  both  felt  wretched  about  her,  though  then  .  I 
did  not  think  her  dangerously  ill,  and  Maria  thought,  too,  she  might 
recover  ;  but  Frank  and  his  sister  Maria  had  been  crying  about 
her,  and  saying  they  and  their  father  were  so  distressed  about  her 
future  state  ;  that  they  thought  her  so  unprepared  to  die  ;  that  they 
hoped  Julia  Mills  would  be  kept  from  her  till  the  doctor  gave  up 
all  hope,  but  then  Charles  would  send  for  her  and  let  her  preach. 
All  this  aroused  my  ire,  and  I  sorrowfully  and  devilishly  replied  : 
'  If  they  are  to  weep  for  her  unprepared  state,  let  them  first  weep 
for  themselves,  for  she  is  more  prepared,  as  far  as  conduct  and  belief 
go,  than  they  are.'  Next,  dear  Carrie  Neilson  came  to  me,  and 
said    she    thought    someone  ought   to   let  her  know  she  was  con- 


206  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

sidered  so  ill,  and  talk  to  her  of  a  future  state  and  comfort  her.  I 
said  :  '  I  will  go  to-morrow  '  (that  was  yesterday)  '  and  pass  the  day 
with  her,  and  try  to  draw  from  her  her  state  of  mind,  though  I  am  far 
from  thinking  her  in  a  dangerous  state  of  health.'  I  went  and  found 
her  sitting  up  waiting  for  the  doctor,  but  she  had  had  a  bad  night, 
and  was  having  those  sinking  turns.  I  gave  the  conversation  a 
cheerful  tone,  and  we  talked  about  Little  Dot  in  '  The  Cricket  on 
the  Hearth  '  (do  get  it  and  read  it,  price  sixpence),  by  Dickens,  and 
then,  as  she  felt  so  much  better  and  cheerful,  I  said  :  '  Shall  I  read 
your  Bible  to  you,  and  then  Jay  ? '  She  said  :  '  Oh  !  yes,  do,  dear, 
for  my  eyes  are  so  bad  I  cannot  read  them  to-day.'  I  read  her  the 
loth  chapter  of  John  :  '  I  am  the  door  ;  no  man  can  come  unto  the 
Father  but  by  ttie.'  I  then  took  the  opportunity  of  commenting 
upon  the  chapter,  and  said  to  her  :  '  Now,  dear  Anna,  I  often  talk  to 
you,  and  you  assent  to  what  I  say,  but  you  never  talk  to  ?ne.  I  wish 
for  my  comfort  you  would  tell  me  in  your  own  words  and  language 
what  your  religious  views  are ;  and  now  that  you  are  comparatively 
in  health  of  mind  and  body,  tell  me,  if  sickness  should  come  upon 
you,  for  I  might  not  be  able  to  speak  to  you  then — tell  me  what  hope 
you  have  for  eternity.'  As  I  spoke  her  eyes  filled  with  tears,  and 
her  lip  quivered,  and  she  rose  in  great  agitation,  and  walked  the 
room,  saying  :  '  When  I  feel  a  little  better,  III  speak  to  you,  but  I  cati- 
not  now.'  Soon  she  sat  down  and  I  said  :  '  Don't  be  agitated,  dear 
Anna,  'and  I'll  speak  to  you.  You  know.  Christians  love  to  talk  of 
these  things,  one  to  another,  and  they  ought  to  do  so,  and  sisters  who 
love  each  other  as  we  do  ought  to  talk  of  what  is  so  far  more 
important  than  any  other  subject  can  possibly  be.'  She  said  : 
'  Does  the  doctor  think  I  am  going  to  die  ?  Do  you  think  this  is 
consumption  ?'  '  No,  dear  Anna,'  I  said,  'God  forbid  ;  if  I  thought 
so,  or  he  thought  so,  I  could  not  speak  to  you  with  this  firm  voice  ; 
but  it  is  because  I  see  you  now  so  well  that  I  want  you  to  talk  with 
me,  for  these  illnesses  are  always  warnings  to  us  how  soon  our 
health  may  be  taken  from  us,  and  if  you  were  really  ill,  I  might  not 
be  able  to  speak  then  to  you,  and  as  you  have  never  told  me  exactly 
your  feelings,  though  I  have  often  told  you  mine,  it  would  be  a  com- 
fort to  }}ie  to  know.'  I  then  went  on  pointing  out  to  her  how  sim- 
ple and  easy  was  the  way,  the  true  and  living  way  through  Christ, 
just   as   you   would   tell  your  child   to   enter  by   the  door,  so  much 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — NEW    ORLEANS,    1 846.      20/ 

easier  than  climbing  up  any  other  way,  or  trying  to  enter  heaven  by 
justifying  yourself  in  the  sight  of  God.  She  was  much  agitated, 
and  assented  *  Yes,  yes  I  '  to  all  I  said,  but  would  say  nothing  her- 
self. My  fears  for  her  are  these  :  She  will  not  acknowledge  herself 
a  poor  sinner  in  the  sight  of  God,  but  thinks  if  she  do  we  will  all 
think  ill  of  her,  and  so  she  seeks  rather  to  justify  herself  to  her 
fellow-men,  and,  I  fear,  to  her  God,  too.  I  soon  turned  the  con- 
versation, but  with  a  heavy  heart,  to  more  cheerful  subjects,  and 
she  got  much  better.  Then  Mrs.  Dr.  Berger  came  in,  a  nice, 
plain  woman,  whom  Anna  kissed  and  called  Rebecca,  and  seemed 
glad  to  see.  Then  came  in  Maria,  and  she  seemed  to  know  Mrs. 
Berger  intimately,  too,  and  after  she  had  gone  they  told  me  she 
was  a  Miss  Aspinwall,  John  Aspinwall's  sister,  Charles  Winthrop's 
brother-in-law  that  was.  To-day  she  called  upon  me,  with  her 
daughter,  Mrs.  Trudeau,  a  doctor's  wife,  too,  and  living  in  the 
same  house  with  her  children,  but  I  was  out  at  Anna's,  and  did 
not  see  them.  I  had  many  other  callers,  but  will  not  fill  my  sheet 
with  naming  them.  Well,  Berger  yesterday,  after  this  conversation, 
felt  her  pulse,  and  thought  her  better^  but  in  the  evening  Charles 
Winthrop  came  here  and  said  she  had  had  another  bad  attack,  and 
that  he  had  been  for  the  doctor  again.  He  came  here  this  morn- 
ing, and  at  length  wept  outright.  He  said  he  had  no  hope  of  her 
ultimate  recovery,  and  he  thought  Dr.  Berger  had  but  little,  if  any  ; 
that  she  had  been  awake  all  night  and  in  a  state  of  great  distress  of 
mind,  and  said  :  '  I  had  been  talking  to  her,  and  she  could  not  bear 
to  think.'  She  then  told  Charles  the  outline  of  our  conversation, 
and  he  said  he  thought  I  was  right  in  speaking  to  her,  for  he  had 
little  hope  of  her  state  of  mind  for  eternity.  I  then  took  the  oppor- 
tunity of  teaching  him,  poor  fellow,  through  her.  He  said  she  had 
sent  him  for  me,  as  she  wanted  to  se4  me  ;  but  she  wanted  Maria 
or  Mary  Parkin  to  be  in  the  room  to  keep  me  from  talking  seriously 
to  her  ////  she  was  better.  O  William,  what  I  felt  and  do  feel  ! 
fear  of  injuring  her  bodily  health,  and  yet,  if  these  sinkings  be  the 
precursors  of  death,  fearing  to  let  her  pass  into  eternity  deceiving 
her  own  self.  But  she  does  not  deceive  herself ;  she  is  utterly 
wretched,  afraid  to  die  and  afraid  to  thi7ik  !  Oh,  that  she  knew  the 
joyful  sound,  the  free,  free  gift  of  the  Gospel,  without  money  and 
without  price  !     If  she   could  be  convinced   of  sin   and  led  to  her 


208  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Saviour,  the  sure  refuge  !  In  part  she  is  convinced  of  sin — that  is, 
she  feels  a  burden.  She  is  trying  not  to  look  at  an  enemy  she  dares 
not  face,  and  tries  to  conceal  and  palliate  her  sins.  Oh,  pray  for  me 
and  pray  for  her,  my  blessed  husband,  that  God  may  give  me  grace  to 
be  faithful,  and  yet  that  I  may  not  wound  or  destroy  where  I  want  to 
heal  !  All  seem  to  look  for  me  to  speak  to  her  words  of  eternal 
life,  for  I  only  have  been  long  accustomed  to  speak  on  these  things 
to  her,  and,  of  all  others,  have  the  mo^t  influence  with  her.  She 
said  to-day,  when  no  one  was  speaking  to  her,  and  Mary  Parkin  was 
out  of  the  room  :  '  That  dear,  precious  Maria  De  Peyster  I '  And 
yesterday  she  told  me  she  loved  her  dearly.  There  is  one  point 
gained,  thanks  be  to  the  God  of  mercy.  I  am  not  going  there 
to-morrow,  but  Maria  goes  in  my  place.  I  am  quite  well,  and  so  are 
all  the  dear  children. 

**  Thursday,  February  5,  1S46.  No  news  yet  to-day  of  Anna.  I 
am  just  going  to  send  Powell  to  ask  after  her.  No  smoke  since  I 
last  wrote  to  you  our  misfortunes.  All  well  ;  Helen  lovely.  Harrie 
sends  her  love,  and  says  she  is  nine  pages  past  '^  fatal.'' 

"Ever  thine  own  "  H." 

"New  Orleans,  Saturday,  February  17,  1846. 
"  My  Sweet  Wife  : 

"  The  mail  failed  yesterday  beyond  Charleston,  and  to-day  beyond 
Montgomery,  consequently  two  mails  are  due  from  New  York,  and 
I  have  nothing  later  from  you  than  when  I  last  wrote  to  you.  I 
then  said  I  had  been  bothered  by  Sellar  urging  on  me  the  necessity 
of  my  remaining  in  this  country,  so  I  thought,  to  relieve  my  mind,  I 
would  set  down  my  thoughts  on  paper,  and  so  I  scrawled  them  down 
and  made  various  corrections,  after  which  I  yesterday  copied  out 
the  inclosed  to  the  'trio,'  addressed  to  Cross.  I  intended  to  have 
made  it  part  of  a  longer  letter  about  other  matters,  but  afterward 
decided  to  write  only  about  the  one  subject, and  so  stuck  in  the  address 
at  the  head  of  the  first  page,  as  you  will  see.  I  decided  after  writ- 
ing to  the  'trio '  I  would  not  send  the  letter  in  the  usual  way  to 
Cross,  but  would  inclose  it  in  one  to  John  Dennistoun,  and  leave 
him  to  communicate  its  contents  to  the  other  two,  or  not,  as  he 
thought  fit.  Finally  I  determined  to  inclose  both  letters  to  you, 
which  I  now  do,  that  you  may  read  and  then  forward  them  if  you 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — NEW   ORLEANS,    1 846.      209 

think  fit.  /  think  it  will  be  best  to  forward  them,  but  if  you  don't 
approve  of  my  giving  them  even  the  chance  of  keeping  us  longer  in 
this  country,  then  do  you  write  on  the  vacant  leaf  of  the  letter  to 
John — either  to  him  or  to  Fanny — that  you  do  not  approve  of  my 
plan  and  want  to  get  settled  at  home,  or  anything  else  you  like  ; 
and  send  me  a  copy  of  what  you  do  write.  Of  course  you  will 
understand  that  if  you  send  forward  my  letters  at  all,  the  letter  to  the 
'  trio  '  must  go  inclosed  in  the  one  to  John.  You  will  seal  the  latter 
securely  and  give  it  either  to  Mr.  Dawson  or  to  John  Yuille  to  be 
postpaid,  or  it  will  not  go  forward  ;  don't  trust  it  to  anyone  else.  If 
it  leave  New  York  not  later  than  February  26,  which  will  be  a  Thurs- 
day, it  will  be  in  good  time  for  the  Boston  steamer  of  March  i,  so 
you  will  have  plenty  of  time  to  think  the  matter  over.  You  had 
better  tell  John  Walter  to  ask  John  Yuille  or  Mr.  Dawson  to  come 
to  you,  and  deliver  the  letter  into  his  own  hand,  so  that  there  shall 
be  no  mistake  about  it.  This  has  been  a  lovely  day  after  two  days' 
rain — clear  and  bright,  warm  and  cheerful.  I  called  on  Helen  Nich- 
olson and  Mrs.  Slidell,  and  found  both  out.  I  afterward  met  Sam 
Nicholson,  who  asked  me  where  I  hid  myself,  and  begged  I  would 
come  and  see  them  in  the  evening.  We  had  a  dinner  party  to-day, 
consisting  of  Mr.  Key  of  Acadie  (a  relative  of  the  '  Star-Spangled 
Banner  '  Key),  Mr.  Trudeau,  a  brother  of  Dr.  Berger's  son-in-law, 
and  Mr.  Cruger.  In  the  evening  I  went  to  Bravo's  reading  room, 
where  I  met  Mr.  Robert  Leech,  a  very  nice,  mild  fellow,  although  a 
Unitarian,  and  a  good  free-trader.  He  and  I  got  talking  on  Eng- 
lish politics,  and  we  adjourned  to  a  cafe  and  had  a  cup  of  chocolate, 
and  I  am  just  come  home ;  it  is  a  fine,  clear,  moonlight  night.  I  have 
just  been  thinking  that  if  I  live  till  the  20th,  now  only  thirteen  days 
off,  it  will  be  time  for  me  to  tell  you  not  to  write  to  me  here  any 
more,  because  I  shall  have  left  for  the  North  before  your  letters  can 
reach,  unless  something  unexpected  should  come  out  by  the  next 
steamer  to  detain  me.  By  the  time  this  reaches  you  very  im- 
portant news  will  probably  also  have  reached  you.  I  hope  that 
villain  Peel  will  go  for  *  total  and  immediate  repeal,'  but  I 
doubt  him. 

"  Is  my  dear  Charlotte  writing  any  essays,  or  poetry,  or  what  is 
she  about  ?  You  don't  mention  her  in  your  last.  How  I  would  like 
to  kiss  wee  fat  Helen,  with  her  '  No  more  tum,  no  more  party.' 


210  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF     WILLIAM     WOOD. 

God  bless  them  all  and  you  and  me.  Good-night,  dearest,  and 
*  rosy  dreams  and  slumbers  light.'  I  hope  we  may  both  hear  good 
sermons  to-morrow. 

"  If  you  should  decide  not  to  forward  the  inclosed,  don't  burn 
them,  but  keep  them  till  I  return,  and  it  will  save  me  the  trouble  of 
rewriting  them  should  I  then  determine  to  send  them  forward. 

"  Sunday,  February  8,  1846.  Your  delightful  letter  of  January 
28  came  to  hand  to-day,  and  amused  me  very  much.  So  Maria 
thinks  my  notions  about  Cromwell  are  very  queer,  and  my  reading 
his  '  Life '  on  Sunday  the  effect  of  my  mother's  views  and  my  early 
education.  Now,  my  early  education  was  to  keep  the  Sunday  very 
strictly  :  church  twice  a  day,  and  a  Scottish  metrical  psalm  or  part  of 
a  chapter,  or  both,  for  evening  recreation,  to  learn  off  by  heart,  besides 
repeating  all  the  chapters  I  already  knew  in  addition,  and  at  last  I 
knew  so  many  that  I  could  say  only  half  each  Sunday.  My  father 
and  mother  were  so  strict  that  they  never  had  a  dinner  cooked  on 
Sunday,  but,  to  make  up  for  this  crucifying  of  the  flesh  with  its 
affections  and  lusts,  we  had  a  '  high  tea ' — tea,  cold  ham,  hot  but- 
tered toast,  and  '  fixin's.'  Thirty  years  after  my  mouth  waters  at  the 
recollection  of  these  '  fleshpots  of  Egypt,  the  onions  and  the  leeks 
and  the  garlic'  When  the  buttered  toast  was  browning  before  the 
kitchen  fire,  didn't  I  sit  with  one  eye  on  my  old  red  psalm  book,  and 
the  other  on  the  pile  of  toast,  keeping  the  Sabbath  (which  was  not 
the  Sabbath)  after  the  straitest  sect  of  the  Pharisees  ?  Therefore 
-my  mode  of  keeping  Sunday  is  not  the  effect  of  early  education,  for 
I  can't  even  yet  conscientiously  whistle  on  Sunday,  but  the  effect  of 
reflection  that  '  the  Sabbath  is  made  for  man,  and  not  man  for  the 
Sabbath';  and  as  for  my  notions  about  Cromwell  being  'queer,'  I  am 
satisfied  that  they  are  correct,  which  is  the  main  thing.  He  was  one 
of  the  greatest  and  most  sincere  men  that  ever  lived,  just  as  she, 
(Maria)  is  one  of  the  sweetest  women,  and  one  whom  I  love  dearly, 
and  so  give  her  a  kiss  for  me.  Dear  wee  Willie,  crying  about  his 
worsted  all  in  '  snugs  ' — I  just  think  I  see  him.  You  did  not  tell  me 
about  Aunt  Morris'  visit.  By  the  way,  if  Brodhead  call  again  and 
is  alone,  give  him  my  kind  regards,  and  say  that  General  Cass  is  not 
'the  coming  man':  he  may  depend  upon  it  he  is  too  warlike  or 
quasi-warlike  for  the  East  and  South,  and  if  our  corn  law  be 
repealed,  he  will  be  too  warlike  for  the  West,  and  will  be  '  whistled 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED— NEW   ORLEANS,    1846.      211 

down  the  wind  a  prey  to  fortune.'  Brodhead  will  understand  what 
I  mean. 

"  I  see  you  are  as  much  bothered  as  I  am  about  our  future 
'  habitat.'  In  the  course  of  my  reading  this  evening  I  came  across 
the  following  verse  (Isaiah  xlii.  16) :  '  And  I  will  bring  the  blind  by  a 
way  that  they  knew  not  j  I  will  lead  them  in  paths  that  they  have  not 
known  J  I  will  make  darkness  light  before  them,  and  crooked  things 
straight.  These  things  will  I  do  unto  them,  and  not  forsake  them.' 
I  trust  that  God  will  make  the  darkness  light  before  us  and  crooked 
things  straight,  I  should,  with  you,  prefer  living  in  England  on 
account  of  J.  Walter,  and  yet,  with  perseverance  and  hard  study,  he 
might  more  easily  make  himself  a  name  in  this  country  as  a  lawyer 
than  in  England.  My  inclination  to-day  is  to  go  home.  We  would 
have  a  new  paper  on  the  library  and  a  new  carpet  and  curtains,  and 
if  you,  you  blessed  one,  are  spared  to  me,  what  care  I  for  other  society 
than  that  of  my  wife  and  children. 

"  '  Monarchs,  we  envy  not  your  state, 
We  look  with  pity  on  the  great.' 

I  suspect  with  average  good  fortune  and  the  blessing  of  God  we 
should  really  be  more  respected,  greater  people,  if  you  will,  in  Liver- 
pool than  in  New  York.  There  is  some  prestige  in  my  favor  in 
Liverpool,  both  on  my  own  account  and  from  my  connections, 
whereas  in  New  York  nobody  but  Maria  cares  a  copper  about  us, 
and  she  has  her  own  children  to  look  after,  and  there  is  no  male 
person  in  New  York  I  care  about  but  De  Peyster.  I  think  there  is 
more  cutthroat  competition  in  trade  in  New  York  than  in  Liverpool, 
and  far  more  than  there  is  in  New  Orleans  ;  that  is,  it  is  pleasanter 
to  do  business  in  Liverpool  or  here  than  in  New  York  ;  so  upon  the 
whole  I  am  for  going  home  ;  but  I  may  change  to-morrow.  The 
ministers  here  are  certainly  poor  sticks.  A  Mr.  Van  Rensselaer 
preached  for  Dr.  Scott  to-day  ;  his  prayers  were  short  and  rather 
good,  but  his  sermon  was  long  and  prosy  beyond  endurance.  After 
it  I  took  a  walk  up  the  Levee,  and  intended  to  go  down  the  Shell 
Road,  but  found  it  crowded  with  carriages  and  pedestrians  and 
equestrians  going  to  see  a  great  foot  race  on  the  Metairie  course. 
This  crowd  spoiled  my  walk,  so  I  turned  and  went  down  the  opposite 
side  of  the  canal,  where  I   was  out  of  the  dust  and  noise,  and  had  a 


212  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

pleasant  walk  by  myself.  The  trees  are  bursting  into  leaf,  and  some 
are  green,  and  the  cypresses  reddish.  Ten  days  more  will  make  the 
country  full  of  'greenth.'  The  weather  was  warm  and  clear  to-day, 
but  this  evening  it  is  wet,  so,  as  Dr.  Scott  is  away,  I  have  stayed  at 
home  and  read  Isaiah  and  Bessie's  favorite,  the  Epistle  to  Titus.  By 
the  way,  I  read  a  chapter  of  Isaiah  every  night,  and  am  now  at  the 
44th.  That  is,  I  read  it  and  some  previous  ones  to-night,  so  prob- 
ably the  night  you  get  this  I  shall  be  at  the  54th.  After  reading  I 
sang  some  hymns  aloud  to  myself,  one  of  which  was  :  '  Not  all  the 
blood  of  beasts,'  etc.  I  suppose  you  will  send  on  the  letter  to  John  ; 
you  see  I  don't  commit  myself  to  stay  if  I  don't  want  to,  and  it 
would  certainly  be  pleasanter  to  go  home  if  we  knew  that  we  were 
very  much  wanted  there.  Whether  would  you  rather  stay  on,  on  this 
side,  or  go  home,  and  come  out  here  again  bag  and  baggage  should 
it  prove  necessary,  and  not  be  separated  at  all  ?  I  am  afraid  if 
we  were  spared  and  it  became  necessary  for  us  to  come  out  to  the 
United  States  again,  the  bother  would  be  greater  than  ever.  How 
well  it  is  for  us  that  our  times  are  in  God's  hands,  and  that  he  will 
direct  our  future  course. 

"  Give  my  love  to  all  my  olive  branches.  I  saw  Helen  Nicholson 
taking  a  drive  on  the  Shell  Road  ;  she  bowed  very  kindly  to  me 
across  the  canal.  I  hear  to-night  that  Buchanan  is  out  of  the  cabi- 
net at  Washington  and  Calhoun  in,  so  now  hurrah  !  for  free  trade 
and  peace.  I  think  Foster  will  need  now  to  admit  that  the  tariff 
must  be  radically  altered.  By  the  way,  I  know  the  reason  that  the 
British  Quarterly  abuses  Carlyle.  It  is  because  he  calls  Dr.  Vaughn's 
'  Protectorate '  very  watery,  and  the  doctor  himself  he  calls  '  Dry-as- 
dust ' — not  a  bad  name  for  him.  Carlyle  with  all  his  Carlylism  is 
worth  sixteen  dozen  Dr.  Vaughns,  much  as  I  like  Dr.  Vaughn  as  a 
preacher. 

"  Monday,  February  9.  This  is  a  cold,  bleak  day.  I  have  no  news 
to  tell  you.  May  God  direct  you  with  regard  to  the  enclosed  what 
to  do,  and  what  to  write  to  Fanny  and  John  D.  Don't  say  a  syllable 
about  the  contents  of  my  letters  to  John  D.  and  the  trio. 

"  Has  Paschal  Strong  got  a  situation  yet  ?  I  hear  of  nothing  here 
that  would  suit. 

"  Ever  thine  own  attached 

"  Wm.  W." 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — NEW    ORLEANS,    1 846.      213 

"New  York,  February  8,  1846. 
*'  My  Beloved  William  : 

"  John  Walter  was  wrong  in  saying  the  last  date  from  you  was  Jan- 
uary 20 — it  was  29,  and  so  far  from  being  long  on  the  road,  arrived 
more  quickly  than  usual.  I  am  sorry  you  have  taken  a  disgust  to 
Liverpool,  for  I  still  think  it  is  the  place  to  which  we  shall  return, 
and,  if  so,  we  must  try  and  like  it,  and  by  no  means  cherish  a  dis- 
contented spirit. 

"  I  hope,  my  darling,  you  have  not  ventured  into  Texas,  or,  if  so, 
that  God  will  bring  you  safely  and  quickly  out  of  it  before  I  can 
know  anything  of  your  being  there. 

"  Your  meeting  th«  Spencers  again  must  have  been  quite  like  the 
meeting  of  old  friends.  I  wish  very  much  they  could  be  of  your 
party  a  part  of  the  way  home. 

"  Do  you  know,  darling,  that  we  have  only  thirty-five  days  more  now 
to  March  15  ?  Oh,  how  I  long  to  see  you  ;  the  longer  I  wait  the  more 
anxious  I  become  to  clasp  you  to  my  heart  once  more,  and,  oh,  this 
parting  in  July  !  How  can  it  be  ?  I  feel  as  if  nothing  could  com- 
pensate me  for  this  serious  evil  of  separation.  Oh,  if  you  could  see 
our  dear  children  now,  you  would  not  want  to  leave  them.  Helen, 
so  fat  and  sweet,  shaking  her  fair  ringlets  off  her  little  plump  cheeks, 
and  just  now  telling  Powell,  who  has  just  come  in  from  church,  that 
mamma  '  re-Ne-aomi,'  meaning,  has  just  been  reading  about 
Naomi  and  'poor  Orpah.'  I  have  been  reading  the  story  of  Ruth  to 
Willie  and  Harriet.  The  former  she  (Helen)  now  calls  '  Weely.' 
What  she  said  about  Naomi  was  not  taught  her  ;  she  just  picked  it 
up  from  my  reading.  Harriet  she  calls  '  Harryet,'  and  says  *  Wal-ter,' 
and  'Charlotte.'  'Bessie' she  cannot  say,  and  always  frowns  and 
says,  '  Dun-know.'  Willie  interrupts  me  in  the  middle  of  my  reading 
Ruth  to  say  :  '  Did  Solomon  build  God  a  house,  or  did  Cupids  ? ' 
What  the  bright  idea  was  from  I  could  not  trace.  Harriet  sends 
much  love  to  you.  She  is  looking  pale  and  dark  below  the  eyes.  I 
have  given  her  some  medicine,  and  hope  she  will  soon  be  better. 

"  I  made  an  arrangement  with  the  children  last  week  that  I  would 
engage  myself  to  furnish  four  plain  money  boxes  a  year,  to  be 
opened  every  three  months,  for  the  deposit  of  any  secret  sums  of 
money  which  they  may  feel  disposed  to  put  in  for  the  poor,  or  for 
the  spread  of  the  Gospel,  as  may  be  thought  best  by  the  majority  of 


214  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

them,  at  the  time  of  opening.  The  money  (if  put  in  at  all)  is  not  to 
be  put  in  but  at  such  times  as  no  eye  can  see  them  but  God,  and 
they  are  not  to  tell  one  another  about  it,  or  seek  any  praise  of  men, 
but  that  the  giver  of  two  shillings  shall  be  no  more  thought  of  by 
me  than  she  who  gives  a  penny.  God  only  is  to  know  ho7v  much 
they  give,  or  if  they  give  anything  at  all.  The  money  is  to  be  earned 
by  them  in  the  following  manner,  and  they  may  spend  it  on  them- 
selves entirely  if  they  wish,  and  think  it  right ;  spend  it  for  some- 
thing useful  to  themselves,  or  uselessly — I  ask  no  account  of  it  ; 
spend  part  of  it  on  themselves,  and  put  part  of  it  in  the  box,  or  do 
anything  they  like  with  it,  only  I  put  the  money  box  there  in  the 
way.  They  know  it  is  for  the  cause  of  God  and  God's  poor  ;  that  it 
is  right  to  give  from  pure  motives,  because  God  has  commanded  us 
to  do  so,  and  wrong  to  waste  or  be  extravagant,  and  over  indulge 
ourselves  in  luxuries.*  The  money  is  to  be  earned  by  general 
amiability  of  conduct,  unselfishness,  and  courteous  and  obliging 
manners.  At  the  end  of  every  week  the  children  vote  for  the  one 
whom  they  think  has  best  deserved  six  cents,  and  I  give  in  my  vote* 
which  counts  iox  two.  Willie's  and  Harrie's  votes  are  only  valued  at 
half  a  vote,  as  they  may  judge  capriciously,  or  from  the  recent 
recollection  of  wrong,  or  fresh-done  act  of  kindness,  and  so  not 
justly.  Another  six  cents  is  to  be  awarded  by  me  only,  and  not  by  the 
children's  vote.  This  is  to  be  the  reward  of  punctuality,  and  will  be 
given  to  the  child  who  has  been  most  regularly  in  its  place  at  meals 
and  family  worship,  and  has  behaved  most  quietly.  No  one  is  to  be 
considered  as  punctual  who  comes  rushing  in  at  the  last  moment,  or 
well-behaved  who  makes  a  disorderly  scramble  for  a  seat.  Bessie 
got  the  six  cents  for  amiability  last  week,  and  Charlotte  for  punctu- 
ality. Bessie  got  my  vote  for  amiability,  Charlotte's  vote,  and  Har- 
riet's vote.  Willie  voted  for  John  Walter  and  John  Walter  for 
Harriet,  and  Bessie  for  Charlotte.  Bessie  had  been  about  as  punc- 
tual, but  Charlotte  had  made  so  much  more  effort,  as  she  has  more 
to  do  in  dressing.  There  was  a  marked  improvement  in  J.  W.  and 
in  Harriet. 

"I  wrote  you  last  on  Thursday  ;  the  next  day  I  spent  pleasantly 
and  profitably  with  dear  Anna  ;  her  religious  views  are  much  more 

*  This  plan  was  kept  up  for  many  years  after  H.  A.  W.'s  death, 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — NEW   ORLEANS,    1 846.      21$ 

simple  and  right  than  I  had  imagined.  She  now  opens  her  heart 
freely  to  me  and  without  producing  agitation,  but  pleasure.  She  has 
had  hvo  entirely  sleepless  nights,  but  last  night  she  slept,  without 
taking  medicine,  from  8  p.  m.  till  4  a.  m.  I  went  to  see  her  to-day 
after  morning  church.  We  had  a  first-rate  sermon  from  Dr.  Hut- 
ton,  but  I  don't  like  the  man  as  I  do  Mr.  Kelly  ;  the  children, 
however,  prefer  him.  Anna  says  Charles  has  been  up  for  the  last 
fortnight  by  daylight  reading  the  Bible  for  an  hour  to  himself  alone  ; 
he  then  reads  to  her.  She  says  though  awake  at  night  she  is 
resolved  never  to  mind  it,  but  just  lie  awake,  and  that  she  has 
some  comforting  thoughts  of  God  which  reconcile  her  to  her  loss  of 
sleep. 

"  Poor  Cornelia*  is  very  ill,  too  ;  her  disease  is  gaining  ground  rap- 
idly, and  she  suffers  much  pain  ;  it  is  said  to  be  dropsy.  I  was 
quite  ill  myself  all  Friday  night.  Maria  is  far  from  well,  but  was 
out  to-day  seeing  Anna  and  at  church.  I  see  Dr.  Berger  every  other 
day  at  Anna  Winthrop's,  which  is  well  for  me,  as  I  begin  to  feel  him 
now  not  so  much  of  a  stranger.  Maria  goes  there  to-morrow.  I 
stay  at  home  to-morrow  and  go  on  Tuesday.  Remember  me  to 
Murray  Thompson  and  Sellar. 

"  Your  ever  devoted  "  H." 

"  New  Orleans,  February  11,  1846. 
"  My  Sweet  Wife  : 

"  I  have  received  your  interesting  letter  of  ist  inst.  to-day,  cov- 
ering dear  Charlotte's  of  January  31,  the  one  in  which  the  '  Hope  ' 
joke  was  contained,  which  was  really  good  and  caused  a  satisfied 
grin  on  the  paternal  'mug.'  I  took  a  regular  'guffaw  '  in  the  office 
at  your  account  of  that  dear  duck  of  a  Willie's  emphatic  way  of  pitch- 
ing coppers  into  the  collection  box,  no  doubt  saying  in  his  own  way 
in  his  own  little  heart  :  '  God,  I  thank  thee  that  I  am  not  as  other 
men  are,  extortioners,  unjust,  adulterers,  or  even  as  this  publican  ;  I 
fast  twice  in  the  week,  I  give  tithes  of  all  that  I  possess.'  Still,  I  thank 
God  that  it  was  in  his  heart  to  give,  and  that  he  persevered  so  long 
in  the  good  intention,  and  carried  it  out,  although  the  ending  was 
*  part  of  iron  and  part  of  clay,'  like  the  image  in  the  plain  of  Dura. 

*  Cornelia  Kane  Smythe,  sister  of  H.  A.  W. 


2l6  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

I  think  that  Dr.  Hutton's  sermon  was  a  very  good  one  on  the  text.  I 
believe  that  there  is  much  more  pleasure  in  acquiring  wealth  than  in 
having  it  after  it  is  acquired,  unless  its  possession  be  made  the  means 
to  a  further  end,  either  of  usefulness  to  our  fellow-men  or  of  fame 
for  ourselves,  or  both. 

"  I  am  sincerely  sorry  to  learn  that  Maria  is  complaining  again  of 
cold.  I  wish  she  were  here  to-day.  After  some  cold  weather  the 
air  to-day  is  balmy,  and  as  mild  as  milk  ;  but  with  the  exception  of 
one  very  warm  day,  when  the  Spencers  were  here,  this  has  been  a 
very  different  winter  from  last,  much  colder  and  with  more  rain.  We 
have  had  fires  on  every  day  but  one,  and  still  continue  them,  although 
the  leaves  are  coming  out  on  the  trees  pretty  fast.  I  don't  think  I 
shall  be  able  to  go  either  to  Hollywood  or  Texas  ;  I  again  find  a 
good  deal  to  do  daily.  I  wrote  a  long  letter  of  thirteen  pages  yes- 
terday to  the  'trio,'  blowing  up  all  and  sundry  for  not  attending 
properly  to  the  business.  I  have  a  strong  suspicion  that  when  I  get 
home  it  will  take  me  several  months  before  I  get  things  into  the 
order  in  which  I  left  them.  It  seems  as  if  I  were  predestined  to  be 
kept  in  constant  hot  water.  Things  here  are  certainly  much  better 
than  when  I  came,  but  still  far  from  as  well  as  I  would  like  them 
to  be. 

"  When  I  was  walking  with  Mylne  on  the  Levee  on  Monday  morn- 
ing, I  was  saying  I  did  not  know  but  that  I  would  take  you  all  home 
in  the  Great  Britain.  '  Do  you  really  intend  to  go  home,  bag  and 
baggage  ?  '  says  he.  '  I  thought  you  might  likely  make  up  your  mind 
to  remain  on  this  side.'  '  Oh,  no,'  said  I,  '  I  must  go  home,'  for  at 
the  moment  I  was  in  my  Liverpool  frame  of  mind.  I  have,  as  usual, 
been  in  a  dozen  different  ways  of  thinking  since.  By  the  way,  tell 
Dawson  or  Yuille  to  put  outside  of  my  letter  to  John  D.  '  Per  Cam- 
bria.' I  have  put  by  mistake  '  Per  Hibertiia.'  The  latter  sailed  ist 
inst.  I  don't  suppose  the  error  is  material,  but  it  is  as  well  to  have 
it  rectified  if  you  or  they  still  have  the  letter.  What  you  recommend 
my  doing,  that  is  to  pray  on  the  subject  of  our  future  residence,  is 
just  what  I  have  been  doing  for  a  month  or  two,  but  I  never  con- 
tinue '  in  one  stay  '  for  two  hours  together.  I  would  like  to  go  home 
to  take  a  part  in  politics.  I  am  a  greater  man  in  Liverpool  than  in 
New  York,  and  besides,  I  like  Mr.  Kelly  better  than  any  minister 
here,  and  I  think  John  Walter  will  be  better  brought  up  in  England 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED — NEW   ORLEANS,    1 846.      217 

than  here,  and  much  as  I  like  America  and  many  Americans,  I 
decidedly  prefer  my  own  country  : 

"  '  Great,  glorious,  and  free, 
First  isle  of  the  earth,  and  first  gem  of  the  sea.' 

There  is  little  or  nothing  to  fight  for  here  except  a  living,  and  in  New 
York  a  station  in  a  miserable,  contemptible  aristocracy  of  money  grubs 
and  shopkeepers  (tell  this  not  in  Gath,  nor  publish  these  opinions  in 
the  streets  of  Askelon)  ;  I  don't  mean  to  say  but  that  New  York  is 
as  good  as,  or  better  than,  Liverpool,  but  then  we  have  London, 
However,  if  I  am  to  fag  all  my  days  in  Liverpool,  and  never  attain 
to  a  seat  in  the  House  of  Commons,  perhaps  I  might  as  well  remain 
in  the  United  States,  yet  I  never  could  feel  to  this  or  to  any  other 
country  as  to  my  own.  In  order  to  do  so  one  ought  to  be  trans- 
planted young,  certainly  not  over  twenty  or  twenty-two. 

"  While  I  recollect,  just  give  my  love  to  Harriet  Mills.  I  think 
she  is  a  fine,  unaffected  girl,  with  a  '  guid  harl  o'  common  sense,' 
and  will  make  a  very  good  wife  to  some  sensible  man  who  would 
appreciate  her  good  qualities  and  keep  her  in  order.  How  is  my 
little  '  niminy-piminy  '  friend  Sarah  getting  on  with  all  her  ad- 
mirers, and  Donna  Julia  ? 

"  '  In  virtue  nothing  earthly  could  surpass  her. 
Save  thine  incomparable  oil,  Macassar.' 

I  wish  she  and  '  Don  Juan  '  would  make  a  match  of  it  before  we  go. 

"  If  we  were  rich,  I  would  be  much  inclined  to  ask  one  of  these 
three  girls  to  come  and  stay  with  us  in  Liverpool  for  a  while  ;  but 
after  all  it  would  be  *  monstrous  dull '  ior  them,  and  would  not '  shoot ' 
us,  as  my  Uncle  Alick  says. 

"  I  think  of  going  to  call  on  Helen  Nicholson  to-morrow  evening. 
I  wish  I  were  beside  you  all  again;  it  is  pretty  dull  sitting  night  after 
night  by  one's  self.  However,  I  feel  it  less  than  most  people,  as  I 
can  either  write  to  you  or  read  to  myself.  I  am  afraid  that  I  shall 
need  to  spend  one  day,  or  possibly  two,  in  Washington  on  my  way 
home.  I  require  to  get  some  information  at  the  Land  Office  there, 
which  may  possibly  detain  me.  However,  I  may  get  it  before  I 
leave  New  Orleans,  as  I  have  written  to  Washington  for  it. 

"  I  should  like,  if  possible,  to  shake  hands  with  Tom  Kane  and 
his  family  on  my  way  through  Philadelphia.     If  I  be  spared  to  come 


2l8  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

safely  back,  I  must  try  and  leave  Philadelphia  in  the  morning,  so  as 
to  reach  you  about  dinner  time,  instead  of  coming  upon  you  in  the 
middle  of  the  night. 

"  '  Oh,  would  I  were  beside  her  now  ! 
Oh,  would  she  listen  to  my  call  ? 
Oh,  would  she  give  me  vow  for  vow. 
Sweet  Alice,  if  I  told  her  all  ?' 

"  Good-night,  you  sweetest  among  women.  God  bless  you  and 
our  dear  children,  and  unite  us  once  more  in  health  and  happiness. 

"  February  12,  1846.  A  lovely  day,  but  cool.  I  am  pretty  busy 
with  one  thing  and  another,  and  therefore  have  only  time  to  say 
God  bless  you  and  all  my  dear  ones. 

"  Ever  thine  "  Wm.  W." 

"  New  York,  February  11,  1846. 
"  My  Beloved  William  : 

"  I  received  yours  of  February  2  last  evening,  Avhere  you  give  us 
all  a  sort  of  scolding — me  for  my  scolding  you,  Charlotte  for  her  flat 
wit,  and  '  Dry-as-dust  '  for  his  poor  writing,  showing  you  to  be  in  good 
spirits,  notwithstanding  you  said  you  were  *  sinfully  dogged  and 
snappish.'  Poor  fellow,  what  will  you  say  when  you  hear  this  war- 
like 7iews?  And  what  if  we  should  be  sent  out  of  the  country, 
whether  we  will  or  no  ?  Cotton  will  go  up,  I  suppose,  but  then,  I 
suppose,  as  usual,  we  have  none  on  hand  to  reap  the  benefit.  I  am 
very  glad  you  are  not  going  to  Texas.  It  is  a  great  relief  to  my 
mind.  Besides,  it  is  not  yet  annexed  to  the  United  States.  I  wish 
I  could  give  you  a  calm  and  contented  mind  about  our  future. 
Depend  upon  it,  it  is  all  fixed  for  us  already,  and  we  may  make  up 
our  minds  to  stay,  and  if  it  is  ?iot  to  be,  some  unforeseen  circum- 
stance will  arise  to  make  us  at  once  determine  to  go  home,  or  we  may 
resolve  to  go,  and  be  obliged  suddenly  to  change  and  stay.  I  am 
sure,  after  all  our  prayers  on  this  point,  God  will  help  us  to  choose 
what  is  best  for  our  spiritual  good,  and  with  that  one  thing  needful 
he  will  give  us  as  many  temporal  comforts  as  will  not  harm  our  bet- 
ter interests.  Bessie  still  remains  firm  to  England  and  home ; 
Charlotte  and  J.  Walter,  like  you,  have  a  '  scunner  '  at  the  idea  of 
it  ;  Powell  and  Harriet  say  the  sooner  the  better  to  be  gone.  /  am 
pretty  nearly  neutral.     For   my  own  sake  I  would  say  retnain,  but  I 


CORRESPONDENCE    CONTINUED — NEW    ORLEANS,    1 846,      219 

am  not  sure  it  is  best  for  you  and  the  children.  I  used  to  fear  that 
remaining  here  would  create  in  us  a  greater  degree  of  worldly- 
mindedness  than  I  had  before,  but  I  find  that  wherever  one  is  there 
is  enough  of  sadness  and  sorrow  to  keep  one  a  little  down,  and,  as 
my  number  of  acquaintances  is  now  not  so  many,  and  I  can  keep 
clear  of  much  visiting,  I  am  a  good  deal  freer  from  the  temptations 
I  dreaded  of  vanity  and  a  foolish  tongue.  Mr.  De  Peyster  has  been 
here  for  about  an  hour,  so  that  I  am  obliged  now  to  put  up  and  go 
to  bed,  it  is  so  late,  and  my  back  aches  so  much.  He  has  been  very 
agreeable  and  very  kind  ;  has  taken  what  I  wrote  yesterday  to  dear 
Cornelia  to  postpay  and  send  off  for  me,  and  my  watch,  which 
has,  to  my  sorrow,  stopped  going  since  yesterday.  There  has 
been  a  letter  from  P.  Smythe  to  Maria  De  Peyster,  received  on  Mon- 
day, 9th  inst.,  saying  that  Cornelia  was  much  worse  than  she  herself 
wrote,  and  begging  Maria  to  come  up  to  see  her  ;  but  not  at  Cornelia's 
request,  only  his  own,  for  she  feared  the  journey  by  land  for  Maria  at 
this  season  to  Albany  would  be  too  much  for  her.  Yesterday  (Tues- 
day) there  was  a  letter  from  Cornelia  Forsyth  (her  daughter)  to  Joe 
Strong,  saying  she  did  not  think  her  mother  so  ill  as  Cornelia 
thought  herself,  which  saying  has  provoked  Maria  not  a  little,  and 
Mr.  De  Peyster  says  :  '  When  a  woman  is  said  to  have  an  incurable 
disease  by  all  the  medical  men  who  see  her,  and  one  speedily 
advancing,  I  think  a  daughter  is  taking  it  very  easily  to  say  she  is 
not  so  bad.'  Maria  cannot  go  up,  because  she  is  not  well  herself,  and 
has  not  been  well  for  some  weeks  past,  and  Dr.  Berger  says  she  must 
take  care  of  herself.  Anna  Winthrop  also  needs  her  care  and  atten- 
tion just  now.  I  spent  Monday  morning  very  pleasantly  with  Anna, 
and  read  many  chapters  in  the  Bible,  and  we  talked  cheerfully  and 
delightfully  on  religious  subjects  together.  She  was  much  better  in 
spirits,  in  looks,  and  in  strength.  Last  night  she  slept  pretty  well, 
and  Maria  was  with  her  to-day,  and  the  report  from  her  was  equally 
good.  /  did  not  go  out  all  day.  Carrie  Neilson  came  with  her 
work  and  passed  the  morning  with  us,  and  little  Willie  Neilson  played 
with  our  Willie.  Both  he  and  Helen  have  colds,  so  they  did  not  go 
out  either.  Margaret  Lawrence  came  in,  and  Eliza  Russell  Hone. 
As  we  were  going  to  dinner  Alethea  Brinckerhoff  came  ;  so  they 
did  not  let  her  in,  which  I  regretted.  I  can't  sleep,  and  it  is  woefully 
dull  to  sit  bolstered  up  in  bed  wide  awake,  and  thinking  how  far  off 


220  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

one's  dearest  friend  and  protector  is,  and  one  who  is  always  so  kind 
to  me  as  you  are  at  these  times,  when  I  am  frail  and  helpless.  God 
bless  you,  darling.  I  will  pray  for  you,  think  of  you,  and  try  to 
dream  of  you. 

"  Your  own  devoted  "  H. 

"Thursday,  February  12,  1846.  Only  thirty-one  days  more  to 
March  15.  This  is  a  bleak,  snowy  day,  and  I  do  not  think  I  shall 
go  out  unless  Maria  sends  her  carriage  for  me  to  go  to  Anna's.  I 
had  a  pretty  good  night  last  night — some  sound  and  refreshing  sleep, 
which  is  a  blessing  we  don't  always  think  of  till  we  are  deprived  of 
it.  Charlotte  begs  me  to  tell  you  that  she  has  conquered  her  stupid- 
ity in  arithmetic  sufficiently  to  be  for  the  second  time  head  of  her 
class.  They  have  a  new  teacher  of  English  at  school,  and  her  last 
composition  was  read  out  to  the  school,  but  without  mentioning  the 
name.  He  said  :  '  This  young  lady  has  some  faults  in  carelessness 
of  style,  but  she  would  do  well  to  cultivate  her  talent  for  writing,  as 
she  bids  fair  at  present  to  become  more  than  one  of  the  ordinary 
run  of  writers,  and  might,  with  care  and  application,  become  a  cele- 
brated writer  for  the  public  !  '  I  told  Charlotte  to  be  content  to 
pass  through  life  quietly  and  usefully  ;  her  talent  for  composition 
should  be  trained  and  cultivated,  but  only,  I  hoped,  to  write  letters 
and  stories  for  her  brothers  and  sisters,  or  her  own  children,  if  she 
ever  had  any  ;  that  neither  her  health  of  mind  nor  body  would  per- 
mit her  ever  attempting  anything  more  ;  she  was  by  far  too  sensi- 
tive to  criticism,  and  her  whole  temperament  too  excitable  and 
nervous  for  anything  out  of  the  common  walks  of  usefulness.  To 
this  she  readily  assented,  and  laughed  at  her  teacher  supposing  her 
capable  of  anything  more,  but  said  she  thought  it  would  gratify  me 
to  tell  me  of  it.  Charlotte  wrote  a  very  good  acrostic  to  Harriet 
Mills,  and  copied  it  out  in  a  most  excellent  hand. 

"  Dear  Helen  and  Willie  have  very  bad  colds — cough,  and  colds 
in  the  head.  Helen  is  rather  feverish  with  it.  Charlotte  has  also 
an  inflamed  eye  from  cold,  and  Powell  and  I  have  rheumatism. 
The  weather  has  been  so  changeable,  from  lovely  spring  days  to 
this  bleak  winter.  Harriet  is  well,  and  has  the  medal  in  her  class 
for  writing.  God  bless  you,  my  own  dearest  Will,  and  send  you 
soon  and  safe  home  to  your  own,  '  for  better  or  for  worse,' 

"  Harriet." 


CHAPTER    XIJ. 


CORRESPONDENCE    CONTINUED. 


"New  Orleans,  February  14,  1846.     Eve  of  St.  Valentine  ; 
or,  more  correctly,  St.  Valentine's  Evening. 
*'  My  Darling  Wife  : 

"  I  have  to-day  received  your  melancholy  letter  of  4th  inst.  about 
poor  Anna  Winthrop.  God  grant  to  you  and  her  an  abundant 
supply  of  his  holy  spirit,  so  that  your  words  spoken  may  sink 
into  her  heart  and  bring  forth  fruit  meet  for  repentance.  Poor 
thing,  what  a  sad,  melancholy  life  she  has  had  of  it !  But  if  we  feel 
for  her  poor  weak  mind  and  body,  do  not  doubt  that  her  heavenly 
Father  sees  and  weighs  well  all  the  circumstances  of  her  lot,  and  he 
will  not  break  the  bruised  reed  nor  quench  the  smoking  flax.  She 
should  be  most  kindly  and  tenderly  dealt  with,  for  I  am  persuaded 
that  her  mind  is,  and  has  long  been,  rather  off  its  balance.  I  have 
no  doubt  that  her  present  illness  is  the  effect  of  overnursing  that 
monstrous  baby  of  hers.  I  am  sure,  poor  thing,  were  I  in  her  place 
and  had  an  assured  reliance  on  the  work  of  Christ,  I  should  be 
right  well  pleased  to  clear  out  and  be  rid  of  all  the  trouble  of  her 
unruly  children  and  the  bother  of  housekeeping.  She  takes  the 
world  dreadfully  hard,  poor  creature,  and,  first  and  last,  she  seems 
to  have  had  a  sore  time  of  it.  I  pray  that  God  will  give  her  that 
peace  which  this  world  cannot  give,  and  that  her  present  illness  may 
be  the  means  of  causing  her  to  draw  nigh  to  God,  and  to  fly  for 
refuge  to  the  Saviour,  and  that  both  her  husband  and  children  may 
have  clearer  views  of  the  truth  as  it  is  in  Jesus.  My  blessed  Har- 
riet, we  hardly  know  what  a  treasure  we  have  in  possessing  the 
knowledge  of  the  way  of  everlasting  life.  Truly  we  may  say  : 
'  Thanks  be  to  God  who  giveth  us  the  victory,  through  our  Lord 
Jesus  Christ.'  But  very  earthly  and  dirty  vessels  the  treasure  is  in, 
and  it  is  indeed  of  God's  mercy  that  he  does  not  entirely  withdraw 
his  grace  and  hide  his  face  from  us.     Deal  gently  with  poor  Anna, 


222  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

as  I  know  you  will  ;  pray  much  for  her,  and  show  her  rather  the 
mercy  and  loving  kindness  of  God  than  his  justice  and  his  wrath  ; 
especially  impress  upon  her  mind  our  Saviour's  most  kind,  most 
merciful  invitation  :  '  Come  unto  me  all  ye  that  labor  and  are  heavy 
laden,  and  I  will  give  you  rest.  Take  my  yoke  upon  you  and  learn 
of  me,  for  I  am  meek  and  lowly  of  heart,  and  ye  shall  find  rest  to 
your  souls,  for  my  yoke  is  easy  and  my  burden  is  light.'  It  is  all 
of  God's /r^^  grace  :  they  that  come  at  the  first  hour  and  they  that 
come  at  the  eleventh  shall  equally  receive  every  man  a  penny.  It 
is  not  of  man  that  willeth  or  runneth,  but  of  God  that  showeth 
mercy. 

"  '  But  what  though  clothed  with  guilt  I  am 
As  with  a  garment  o'er, 
In  Christ,  the  spotless  Lamb  of  God, 

There's  boundless  worth  in  store. 
That  worth  his  merit  all  divine 

Who  died  upon  the  tree 
Can  bring  the  vilest  near  to  God, 
And  that's  enough  for  me.' 

"  How  apt  the  cares  of  this  life  and  the  pursuit  of  business  are  to 
choke  the  Word  within  us,  and  how  constantly  our  adversary  the 
devil,  as  a  roaring  lion,  goeth  about  seeking  whom  he  may  devour  ; 
and  although  we  are  not  ignorant  of  his  devices,  yet  we  are  ever 
allowing  ourselves  to  become  his  prey.  Oh,  my  darling  Harriet,  let 
us  earnestly  watch  and  pray,  especially  me,  that  we  fall  not  into 
temptation,  but  that  I  may  be  sober  and  vigilant  like  a  good  soldier 
of  Jesus  Christ,  and  that,  when  troubles  and  trials  come,  we  may 
both  have  on  the  breastplate  of  faith  and,  for  a  helmet,  the  hope  of 
salvation.  I  shall  not  cease  to  pray  for  you  and  poor  Anna.  I 
hope  God  will  restore  her  to  sound  health  of  body  and  mind,  and 
that  her  soul  may  also  prosper  and  be  in  health. 

"  By  the  way,  you  have  been  doing  yourself  injustice  in  the 
numbering  of  your  letters  ;  although  you  have  jumped  up  from  lo  to 
14,  yet  you  have  not  jumped  far  enough,  for  the  letter  I  got  to-day 
is  the  eighteenth  I  have  received  since  I  left  you,  inclusive  of  the 
note  addressed  to  me,  '  Wanderer  on  the  face  of  the  earth,'  which  I 
found  rolled  up  in  my  nightshirt  when  I  left.  I  do  hope  the  next 
letter  will  bring  more  favorable  accounts  of  Anna  Winthrop. 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED.  223 

"  I  went  to  tea  at  Sam  Nicholson's  on  Thursday  night,  12th  inst., 
and  found  him  and  Helen  at  home,  he  making  the  tea.  They  had 
a  beautiful  tea  set,  and  prime  tea,  of  which  I  took  two  cups  (which 
prevented  my  sleeping).  We  had  a  very  pleasant  chat  for  an  hour 
or  so  by  our  three  selves.  He  is  really  a  very  decent,  pleasant 
fellow,  and  a  sensible  man.  We  had  three  gentlemen  at  dinner  that 
day,  and  so  I  was  dressed,  or  I  do  not  know  that  I  would  have 
taken  the  trouble  to  go.  I  was  very  kindly  pressed  to  come  often, 
and  may  go  once  again  before  I  leave.  I  suspect  that  I  am  natu- 
rally a  very  unsocial,  ungregarious  animal,  for,  with  my  books  or 
writing  to  you,  I  have  never  the  remotest  wish  to  stir  out,  or  have 
anyone  in,  in  the  evening.  I  had  company  this  evening — an  enor- 
mous rat  having  met  me  halfway  down  the  stairs  as  I  was  going  up 
to  my  room. 

"  Sunday,  February,  15,  1846.  When  I  went  to  Dr.  Scott's  this 
morning,  whom  should  I  find  in  the  pew  but  little  Kirkpatrick  from 
Liverpool.  He  had  gone  into  it  by  accident.  Wasn't  it  a  strange 
*  fortuitous  concourse  of  atoms '  ?  Who  would  have  thought  the  last 
time  we  sat  in  Mr.  Kelly's  church  that  the  next  church  we  met  in 
would  be  in  New  Orleans  ?  We  had  a  very  good  sermon  this  even- 
ing upon' casting  all  your  care  upon  Him,  for  he  careth  iox you,'  and 
finished  by  singing  '  Come,  ye  disconsolate.'  In  the  morning  the 
text  was  :  '  He  must  increase,  but  I  must  decrease.'  My  wits  would 
go  a-wool-gathering,  but  Dr.  Scott  said  one  noteworthy  thing,  and 
that  was  that  as  New  Orleans  had  been  the  wickedest  city  in  the 
Union,  he  believed  that  it  would  become  the  most  pious,  in  conformity 
with  St.  Paul's  saying  :  '  Where  sin  abounded,  grace  would  much 
more  abound.' 

"  I  had  a  delightful  country  walk  after  the  morning  service  by  my- 
self. This  day  fortnight,  March  i,  the  Lord's  Supper  is  to  be 
taken  ;  I  hope  to  partake  of  it  for  the  last  time  in  Neiv  Orleans. 

"  I  have  just  written  to  Anna  Cross,  and  last  night  wrote  to  Mary 
Ferguson  for  this  steamer.  I  hope  you  have  written  to  Dr.  Black- 
burn ;  if  not,  I  dare  say  you  may  have  time  to  write  after  you  get  this 
if  you  feel  in  the  humor.     Good-night,  dearest. 

"  Monday,  February,  16,  1846.  Nothing  new.  This  is  a  fine, 
clear,  cold  day.  Give  my  kind  love  to  Anna  Winthrop.  Since 
writing  the  above  I  thought  it  but   decent   for  me   to  reply  to  old 


224  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Dr.  Blackburn,  so  I  have  scribbled  off  a  letter  of  which  the  enclosed 
is  a  copy.     God  bless  you  and  my  dear  children. 
"  Ever  thine  own 

"  Wm.  W." 

"New  York,  Sunday,  February  15,  1846. 
"  My  Darling  William  : 

"I  have  your  very  cheerful,  pleasant  letter  of  February  3-5. 
I  got  it  on  Friday,  13th,  being  in  the  marvelous  short  time  of  eight 
days.     I  cannot  account  for  your  not  receiving  my  letter  sooner. 

"  This  has  been  to  me  a  day  of  darkness  and  of  trouble,  but  I  trust 
my  darling  Helen,  who  has  been  the  cause,  is  now  going  to  be  a  little 
better.  Cough  and  pain  in  the  chest  have  been  increasing  upon 
her  ever  since  I  last  wrote,  and  upon  dear  Willie  also,  though  he  has 
not  been  so  feverish,  and  keeps  up  and  plays  about.  On  Thursday 
night  about  nine  o'clock  I  sent  for  Dr.  Berger,  who  prescribed  doses 
of  syrup  of  ipecac  every  two  hours,  castor  oil,  and  her  chest  rubbed 
with  hartshorn,  and  her  feet  in  hot  water  and  mustard.  On  Friday 
she  was  much  better,  but  on  Saturday  was  worse  again,  and  I  did 
nothing  but  hold  her  all  day  after  ten,  when  I  returned  from  Parmley's 
with  Bessie  and  John  Walter.  At  night  she  seemed  better  again 
after  her  Saturday's  bath,  but  to-day  has  been  much  worse.  I  sent 
for  Berger  ;  he  says  colds  are  very  common  among  children.  The 
weather  is  awful — snowing  and  cold,  and  blowing  furiously  ;  the 
snow  rising  in  large  clouds  from  the  ground.  Berger  says  it  may  be 
whooping  cough,  but  he  scarcely  thinks  so  ;  that  it  is  not  scarlet  fever, 
nor  any  other  complaint,  but  severe  cold,  without  it  may  turn  into 
whooping  cough.  She  has  had  on  a  mustard  blister,  and  is  taking 
flaxseed  tea,  ipecac,  and  all  sorts  of  stuff,  but  has  seemed  very  seri- 
ously ill  all  day  till  now  (5  P.  m.),  when  she  is  a  little  easier,  cheerful, 
and  not  so  hot.  Our  rooms  have  smoked,  first  the  nursery  in  the 
morning  ;  then  fortunately  the  wind  veered  round  and  the  nursery 
has  been  quite  clear,  but  the  parlor  smokes.  My  bedroom  has  had 
the  chimney  built  up  with  brickwork  by  mistake,  and  the  ventilator 
has  been  put  up  on  the  wrong  chimney.  I  have  just  sent  for  Captain 
Comstock,  [the  hotel  keeper],  and  could  scarcely  keep  from  crying 
when  I  showed  him  poor  Willie  groaning  with  earache,  his  head  tied 
up  in  flannel,  and  he  pale  as  a  sheet,  and  begged  that  there  might 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED,  22$ 

be  no  delay,  but  the  evil  remedied  at  once,  that  I  might  have  the  sick 
ones  in  my  bedroom  if  necessary,  I  also  asked  for  that  room  at  the 
end  of  the  passage  by  March  15,  or  before  if  needed — he  promises 
that  I  shall  certainly  have  it  whenever  it  is  wanted  ;  and  at  the  same 
time  I  have  begged  that  any  vacant  rooms  may  at  once  be  offered  to 
me  before  being  disposed  of,  in  case  I  should  want  them.  But  this 
has  been  a  furious  day  of  wind,  so  perhaps  the  chimneys  will  do 
better  after  it  is  over,  Willie  is  roaring  with  pain,  so  I  must  leave 
off. 

"  Monday,  February  16,  1846,  12  noon.  I  am  in  great  haste  to 
get  this  off  before  the  postman  leaves  the  hotel,  but  it  may  be  too 
late  for  to-day's  mail.  I  thought  Helen  so  ill  yesterday  that  I  did 
not  intend  to  send  this  off  till  to-morrow,  lest  you  should  be  uneasy, 
but  she  seems  much  cooler  and  better  to-day,  and  is  up  and  has  her 
dress  on  and  can  play  with  her  doll  ;  has  also  had  a  better  night,  so 
that  I  am  in  great  hopes  that  she  will  now  soon  get  well.  I  promise 
her  every  time  I  want  to  get  her  medicine  down  that  dear  papa  with 
the  whiskers,  who  is  far  away,  shall  come  home  soon  and  bring 
Helen  a  new  doll.  So  please  get  her  one  of  those  pink  kid  French 
things  before  you  come  from  New  Orleans  ;  it  will  not  take  much 
room  in  your  portmanteau. 

"  Charlotte  has  gone  to  school,  as  the  snow  drifted  so  that  it  has 
left  this  side  of  the  street  thoroughly  clean  and  dry.  The  day  is 
fine.  Neither  of  the  rooms  smokes,  and  the  men  are  working  at  my 
chimney  ;  the  mason  work  is  done,  and  the  chimney  open,  I  shall 
have  a  fire  lighted  at  once  to  try  it  when  it  is  finished.  Mr.  De 
Peyster  has  just  been  here  in  his  fine  sleigh.  Anna  Winthrop  very 
much  better,  up  and  dressed  and  cheerful ;  all  harmony  at  her  house. 
Dear  Cornelia  has  been  relieved  by  the  medicine  in  spite  of  the  doc- 
tors, but  is  still  very  ill.  Bess  and  Harrie  have  colds  in  the  head,  and 
cough  a  very  little,  so  I  would  not  let  them  go  to  school.  John 
Walter  has  gone  to  school  and  is  very  well.  Powell  a  little  rheu- 
matic, but  nothing  of  consequence.  Only  twenty-seven  days  to 
March  15.     God  bless  you,  my  own  love.     In  desperate  haste, 

"  Thine  own 

"H.  A.  W," 


226  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

"New  Orleans,  February  i8,  1846. 
"  My  Darling  Harriet  : 

"  I  received  your  sweet  letter  of  the  8th  inst.  to-day. 

"  Now,  my  darling  wife,  I  am  most  grieved  to  see  that  you  have 
been  ill.  I  have  no  doubt  that  your  illness  was  brought  on  by  over- 
exertion and  anxiety  about  Anna  Winthrop.  You  must  not  upon 
any  account  injure  your  own  health  for  the  sake  of  anybody  under 
the  sun.  You  have  a  husband  and  children  entirely  dependent  on 
you,  so  that  you  cannot  be  permitted  to  play  any  such  pranks  as  you 
might  have  done  had  you  remained  single,  as  you  decidedly  said 
you  had  determined  to  do  on  a  certain  occasion.  Indeed,  I  don't 
know  that  you  have  ever  in  words  revoked  that  decision.  I  think 
that  plan  of  yours  of  allowing  the  six  pledges  to  put  their  money 
as  they  find  themselves  prompted  to  do  so  into  the  poor  box  with- 
out the  knowledge  of  anyone  is  excellent,  and  the  plan  of  voting  on 
each  other's  conduct  capital,  teaching  them  betimes  the  habit  of 
self-government. 

"  You  will  know  long  before  this  that  I  have  given  up  the  idea  of 
going  to  Galveston,  or  anywhere  else  except  straight  home,  and  I 
am  most  happy  to  say  that  we  received  to-day  a  letter  from  the 
Commissioner  General,  Land  Office,  Washington,  which  I  think  will 
render  it  unnecessary  for  me  to  remain  at  Washington  on  my  way 
home.  If  you  receive  this  letter  on  February  28,  and  write  a  few 
lines  that  day  and  send  them  off,  I  may  still  get  them  here,  but  if 
you  don't  get  this  by  February  28,  you  must  not  write  again  to  New 
Orleans.  Hurrah  !  hooray  !  hurrah  !  I  wish  you  would  write  and 
send  off  your  letter  on  Saturday,  March  7,  addressed  care  of 
Mitchell  &  Mure,  Charleston,  S.  C.  If  I  leave  this  about  March  9 
(Monday),  I  ought  to  be  in  Charleston  about  March  15,  and  in  New 
York  18  or  19  ;  but  if  the  English  steamer's  letters  reach  this  say 
March  4,  I  may  be  able  to  leave  this  sooner,  as  I  do  not  intend  to 
remain  above  two  days  after  I  receive  them,  unless  there  be  some- 
thing in  them  specially  to  detain  me.  I  hope  I  may  have  decent 
roads  and  good  weather.  I  am  just  as  well  pleased  I  am  not  going 
up  the  Mississippi,  for  the  steamer  Saladin,  arrived  here  this  evening, 
reports  having  run  into  and  sunk  another  steamer  above  Vicksburg, — 
I  forget  her  name, — twenty  people  drowned,  and  ten  badly  scalded. 
I  am  sure  I  have  great  reason  to  be  thankful  that   in  all  our  exten- 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED.  22/ 

sive  voyaging,  mine  especially,  in  steamers,  we  never  even  saw  an 
accident.  John  Walter  tells  me  that  poor  Jenks  lost  ten  dollars  ;  if 
he  have  not  found  the  money,  don't  you  think  J.  W.  could  hit  upon 
some  way  of  giving  him  ten  dollars,  without  offending  his  pride  ? 
You  can  put  the  money  to  debit  of  my  underwriting  account,  that  is, 
just  enter  it  in  your  house  book,  putting  before  it  the  letters  '  W.  W. 
U.  account.'  *  Murray  T.  just  tells  me  to  send  kind  respects.  By 
the  way,  I  called  yesterday  on  Dr.  Scott  and  again  to-day,  but  did 
not  find  him  at  home  either  time  ;  I  had  a  thank-offering  for  the 
city  mission,  which  I  must  contrive  to  give  some  way  or  other.  I 
am  rejoiced  to  know  you  think  that  Anna  Winthrop  has  simple 
views  of  divine  truth,  and  also  that  Charles  W.  is  taking  to  the  Bible  : 
that  is  a  good  sign.  I  am  reading,  besides  the  New  Testament, 
Samuel  and  Isaiah.  I  have  read  right  on  from  Genesis  to  Samuel. 
Really  the  stories  of  the  Old  Testament  are  very  interesting,  and 
recall  the  days  of  one's  youth,  and  a  certain  very  small  square  book 
bound  in  red  morocco  called  '  Bible  Stories,'  full  of  very  small  wood- 
cuts, one  of  which  was  David  playing  on  a  harp,  and  Saul  trying  to 
dig  a  javelin  into  him,  but  which  weapon  was  represented  as  sticking 
in  the  wall  in  front  of  David's  nose,  who  appeared  to  be  less  aston- 
ished than  might  have  been  reasonably  expected,  though  perhaps 
he  thought  it  was  '  only  pretty  Fanny's  way.'  I  wonder  what  Mr. 
De  Peyster  and  others  think  of  Polk's  rejection  of  the  offer  of  arbi- 
tration. I  am  inclined  to  think  that  old  Polk  is  right,  and  for  the 
reasons  stated  in  Buchanan's  last  letter,  but  certainly  at  present  the 
British  appear  to  have  acted  most  amicably  in  the  matter.  I  don't 
believe  there  will  be  any  war  yet,  and  I  do  believe  that  the  matters 
at  issue  will  be  all  peaceably  settled  by  negotiation. 

"  Mrs.  Pelton  has  come  to  town.  I  called  on  her  yesterday,  but 
she  was  out.  Pelton  is  with  Sellar  at  Attakapas,  and  is  coming 
home  to  see  me  before  I  leave.  Good-night,  dearest  ;  God  bless 
you  and  my  dear  children. 

"  February  19,  1846.  A  cold,  raw  morning  ;  nothing  new,  and  I 
am  busy  and  must  '  shut  up.' 

"  Ever  thine  own  "  Wm.  W." 

*  Instead  of  entering  it  as  almsgiving.  W.  W.'s  account  book  was  not  to  dis- 
play the  record  of  his  charities. — E.  D.  K. 


228  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

"  New  York  Hotel,  New  York, 

"Wednesday,  February  i8,  1846. 
"  My  Beloved  Husbaxd  : 

''  You  have  decidedly  put  me  in  what  I  call  '  a  fix.'  That  letter 
of  yours  to  John  D.  has  just  arrived,  together  with  your  very  pleasant 
one  to  me  of  February  7,  8,  and  9.  Now,  dearest  William,  I  have 
read  over  this  letter  of  yours  to  the  '  trio  '  twice  very  attentively,  and 
with  a  flushed  cheek  and  beating  heart,  for  it  is  to  me  one  of  very 
serious  importance.  Here  I  was  interrupted  by  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Dawson 
coming  in  and  spending  the  whole  evening,  and  it  is  now  nine  ;  my 
back  aches  and  I  must  go  to  bed.  This  will  oblige  me  to  make  my 
letter  not  so  long  as  I  intended,  for  to-morrow  I  shall  be  occupied 
so  much  in  nursing  Helen  that  I  shall  not  have  much  time  before 
two  to  finish  it. 

"Helen  is  decidedly  cooler  and  better  to-day,  her  cough  not  so 
severe,  and  she  herself  much  more  lively.  I  had  her  out  in  the  parlor 
for  a  short  time  this  evening  for  change  of  air.  Anna  Russell,  the 
iMorrises,  and  John  Kane  were  here  this  morning  ;  Mrs.  Van  Rens- 
selaer also,  but  I  did  not  see  her.  I  have  not  been  seeing  anyone 
lately  on  account  of  Helen's  being  so  ill.  Dr.  Berger  cannot  yet  say 
if  it  be  whooping  cough  or  not,  as  the  whoop  is  not  yet  formed  ;  but 
/  think  it  has  been  a  very  severe  influenza  only,  as  Sunday  and 
Tuesday  were  her  worst  days,  and  to-day  and  yesterday  she  was  so 
much  better.  Willie  is  quite  unwell  also,  and  Harriet.  Elizabeth 
has  been  home  also  for  two  days  with  cough  and  nausea  ;  and  to-day 
Johnnie  came  home,  as  he  had  such  a  cough  and  headache.  Char- 
lotte keeps  well.  Willie  has  had  no  return  of  earache.  Poor  Mary 
James  is  dead  and  buried  to-day. 

"  Bessie  has  had  two  medals,  neither  of  which  she  will  wear  ;  the 
one  for  good  conduct,  with  the  motto,  '  Many  daughters  have  done 
virtuously,'  etc.,  she  says  is  too  ridiculous. 

"Charlotte  is  just  now  going  through  her  six  weeks'  review,  and 
so  far  she  has  the  largest  number  of  marks,  and  she  hopes  to  be  at 
the  head  of  her  class  of  twenty-five.  She  has  been  trying  very  hard 
to  please_)'(?«  when  you  get  home,  and  as  there  are  so  many  older  girls 
in  the  class,  it  will  be  very  praiseworthy  if  she  gets  the  place.  She 
has  been  writing  some  very  excellent  compositions  at  school,  for  which 
she  is  always  marked  No.  i,  and  she  has  written  five  rhymed  valen- 


CORRESPONDENCE    CONTINUED.  229 

tines — one  to  Harriet,  one  to  Bessie,  one  to  Powell,  one  to  Harriet 
Mills,  and  one  to  Mr.  De  Peyster,  a  beautiful  one,  which  she  sent 
off  by  the  express  post  this  morning.  The  one  she  received  was 
from  Maria,  we  found  out  ;  and  one  since  from  a  girl  at  her  school. 
When  your  letter  came  in  to-night,  Helen  held  out  her  hand  for  it, 
and  said  :  '  It  is  from  dear  papa  with  the  whiskers,'  and  I  gave  it  to 
her  to  hold  till  the  light  came.  When  the  lamp  was  lighted,  I  asked 
her  for  it,  but  she  hugged  it  up  and  said  :  'No,  my  own.'  I  said: 
'  Read  it  to  me,  then.'  She  looked  closely  at  the  writing  on  the  back 
and  said  :  '  Papa  far  away,  turn  home  ;  noo  parlor,  noo  dolly  ! '  This 
meant  you  would  bring  her  a  new  dolly,  and  come  to  the  new  parlor, 
which  she  calls  my  bedroom  since  it  had  a  fire  on.  Captain  Com- 
stock  wanted  me  to  have  one  on  to  try  the  chimney  ;  it  vents  per- 
fectly well  with  Liverpool  coal.  No  smoke  in  the  other  rooms  since 
I  last  wrote.     Good-night. 

"Thursday,  February  19,  1846.  I  have  read  over  your  letter  to 
the  trio  again,  and  am  very  glad  that  I  shall  have  a  few  days  to  think 
over  it  calmly.  I  am  strongly  inclined  to  put  the  letter  by  in  my 
portmanteau  till  you  return,  for  it  seems  to  me  by  your  statements 
therein  that  you  are  almost  asking  to  remain,  and  remaining  involves 
the  necessity  of  two  or  three  months'  separation  from  your  family 
almost  every  year,  at  the  very  least,  either  across  the  Atlantic  or  to 
New  Orleans.  I  take  into  consideration  the  shortness  of  life,  and 
dread  losing  in  separation  any  part  of  it  that  we  might  spend 
together.  Then,  too,  we  must  remember  that  we  cannot  fix  the  dates 
for  your  journeys,  and  they  may  occur  sometimes  when  illness  in  the 
family  or  affliction  renders  it  especially  hard  to  part.  Living  in 
New  York  involves  our  launching  into  greater  expenditure  in  house- 
keeping, entertaining  and  going  more  into  the  fashionable  world  than 
we  would  in  Liverpool,  as  well  as  your  working  harder  in  business. 
Would  we  not  be  more  and  more  absorbed  in  the  things  of  this  world, 
and  less  and  less  in  those  of  God  ?  Might  we  not  grow  gay  and 
careless,  unless  you  felt  the  responsibility  and  anxiety  of  the 
increased  business  so  much  that  both  you  and  I  were  to  be  kept 
gloomy  and  saddened  by  care  ? 

"  Then  I  think  the  trio  know  all  the  necessities  of  your  remaining 
or  coming  home  as  well  as  you  do,  for  they  are  kept  constantly 
advised  of  all  that  occurs  in  business  here  or  at  New  Orleans.     These 


230  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

things  perplex  one's  mind.  I  have  prayed  for  guidance  and  will  do 
nothing  rashly,  but  my  present  intention  is  just  to  seal  your  letter  to 
John  and  send  it  as  it  is  without  a  word  from  me.  If  I  do  it,  my 
reasons  are  because  you  say  you  conscientiously  think  you  ought  to 
remain,  and  that  you  think  you  would  not  be  doing  right  not  to  lay 
the  matter  before  them.  My  own  idea  is  that  you  are  laying  the 
matter  before  them  in  every  business  letter  you  write  without  this 
one  at  all,  and  I  fear  '  a  hasting  to  be  rich,'  an  impatience  of  the  state 
of  'neither  poverty  nor  riches,'  and  a  sort  of  restless  discontent,  are 
at  the  bottom  of  your  perplexities.  Forgive  me  if  I  do  you  wrong. 
As  for  our  being  separated,  /  would  willingly  go  home  to  England 
with  you,  and  come  out  again  bag  and  baggage  if  necessary,  rather 
than  to  endure  separation  again.  I  hope  that  you  will  mention  your 
views  further  in  your  next  letters  before  this  goes,  that  I  may  discern 
more  of  your  mind  upon  the  subject. 

"  Helen  had  a  much  better  night,  and  is  nice  and  cool  to-day  ;  the 

other  four  are  at  school,  as  the  day  is  mild  and  beautiful.     Willie  is 

also  better.     I  have  no  more   letter  paper,  or  would  write  another 

half  sheet.    God  bless  you,  my  darling,  and  preserve  you  from  error. 

"  Ever  thine  own  very  devoted 

"H." 

"  New  Orleans,  February  21,  1846. 
"  My  Sweet  Wife  : 

"  I  am  much  disappointed  at  not  getting  a  letter  from  you  to-day. 
We  have  letters  from  D.  &  Co.  of  Thursday,  12th  inst.  If  you 
had  been  well,  you  would  write  the  day  before,  and  the  letter  would 
have  been  sent  to  Dawson  Thursday  morning,  12th  inst.,  to  go  by 
that  day's  mail,  so  that  the  not  receiving  any  letter  has  made  me 
very  anxious  about  you  all  day,  so  that  I  had  little  or  no  spirit  to  go 
and  order  a  frock  coat  for  myself,  which  I  find  I  need,  and  which 
they  make  as  cheaply  here  as  in  New  York,  and  I  think  rather  better. 
There  dined  with  us  yesterday  Henry  Young,  an  elder  brother  of 
Billy  Young,  who  left  Glasgow  last  October  for  St.  Domingo,  where 
he  has  a  mercantile  house.  He  arrived  here  two  days  ago  from 
Cuba,  which  he  had  reached  from  Jamaica.  He  is  not  such  a  pleas- 
ant, open-countenanced  fellow  as  Billy  Young.  There  also  dined 
with  us  Mr.  Mills,  '  the  Bailie,'  as  he  is  called.     It  was  at  his  solicita- 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED.  23I 

tion  I  consented  to  get  a  frock  coat  here,  he  having  buttered  me  up 
about  my  handsome  figure  in  order  that  I  might  patronize  his 
tailors. 

"  Last  evening,  when  I  was  going  to  bed,  Murray  T.  said  :  '  Oh  ! 
William,  I  wish  you  Avould  have  down  that  hymn  book  of  yours  some 
evening,  as  I  recollect  all  that  hymn,  "  Come,  ye  disconsolate,"  but 
one  word.'  This  seemed  to  be  a  partial  answer  to  my  prayers,  so  I 
went  up  at  once  and  brought  down  the  hymn  book,  and  also  your 
two  miniatures,  and  showed  them  to  Murray.  He  thought  that  by 
Hargrave  of  Liverpool  a  most  speaking  likeness,  as  do  I,  but  he 
thought  the  daguerreotype  detestable.  It  certainly  looks  very  like 
what  I  fear  you  would  look  if  you  were  a  dear  little  sweet  widow. 

"  I  had  a  call  yesterday  from  Dr.  Scott  at  the  office,  and  had  a 
pleasant  chat  with  him.  He  talks  of  visiting  England  either  this 
summer  or  next  year.  I  said  I  should  be  most  happy  to  see  him  at 
Liverpool.  I  gave  him  fifty  dollars  for  the  city  mission,  which  is 
much  needed  here,  and  for  which  there  was  a  collection  last  Sunday, 
but  I  had  nothing  but  fifty  cents  in  my  pocket,  and  I  thought  this 
was,  perhaps,  as  good  a  way  of  spending  money  as  any  other. 

"I  have  just  put  down  notes  of  a  parting  address  to  Mylne  and 
Murray  T.  as  to  the  way  I  think  the  business  ought  to  be  conducted, 
but  I  don't  intend  to  give  them  it  until  just  a  day  or  two  before  I 
leave,  as  it  will  probably  make  them  both  angry.  I  have  not  yet 
made  up  my  mind  decidedly  as  to  giving  them  it  at  all,  but  I  rather 
think  I  ought,  and  if  I  continue  to  think  so,  will  do  it.  The  Lord 
direct  his  unworthy  servant  in  this  thing.  My  blessed  Harriet,  I 
dare  hardly  think  what  may  be  impending  over  me  if  you  be  ill,  you 
darling  ;  and  yet,  if  you  be  ill,  surely  J.  Walter  or  Charlotte  or 
Maria  would  have  written.  May  God  watch  over  and  bless  you  and 
my  dear  children,  and  unite  us  all  together  again  in  health  and 
happiness. 

"  Sunday,  February  22,  1846.  Washington's  birthday.  No  mail  in 
north  of  Charleston  received  to-day,  so  I  am  kept  another  day  in 
suspense  about  you,  my  darling.  This  has  been  a  lovely  day,  bright 
and  warm,  with  a  fine  refreshing  breeze.  I  heard  Dr.  Scott  in  the 
morning,  who  animadverted  in  very  strong  terms  on  the  impropriety 
of  having  theaters  open  on  Sunday,  and  sham  fights  also.  There 
was  one  of  these  to-day  on  the  Bayou  St.  John   in  honor  of  Wash- 


232  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

ington'  s  birthday.  Governor  Johnson,  our  new  Governor,  was  in 
church.  After  sermon  came  home,  expecting  a  letter  from  you,  and 
was  disappointed.  I  then,  in  order  to  be  out  of  the  bustle,  walked 
down  the  riverside,  far  below  the  third  municipality  and  the  lowest 
tier  of  shipping,  and  then  I  sat  down  on  some  planks  and  '  medi- 
tated on  the  water.'  From  my  point  of  view  I  had  a  very  fine  view 
of  New  Orleans,  as  we  saw  it  on  our  first  arrival.  After  my  return 
I  sat  down  to  read  Goode's  '  Better  Covenant,'  but  found  it  was  din- 
ner time.  We  had  Mr.  H.  Flint  and  Mr.  Briggs  dining  with  us. 
Since  then  I  have  been  at  evening  church  and  heard  Dr.  Wither- 
spoon  of  North  Carolina,  a  very  commonplace  old  gentleman.  By 
the  by,  I  hear  that  Tom  Slidell's  little  boy  is  out  of  danger.  I 
believe  I  mentioned  in  my  last  that  he  was  dangerously  ill  of  typhoid 
fever. 

"  I  long  to  see  you  again,  my  dearest,  and  to  hear  your  sweet 
voice.  God  grant  that  I  may  meet  you  and  all  my  dear  children  in 
health  and  happiness  in  this  world,  and  in  due  time  in  the  next. 
Good-night,  my  soul's  beloved. 

"Monday,  February  23,  1S46.  I  have  just  received  your  very 
interesting  and  amusing  letter  of  nth  and  12th  inst.,  wherein  you 
tell  me  about  dear  Charlotte's  composition  being  so  much  compli- 
mented. I  am  delighted  to  hear  that  poor  Anna  Winthrop  was 
in  so  much  better  a  frame  of  mind.  Poor  Cornelia  seems 'wearin' 
awa'  to  the  land  o'  the  leal.'  I  am  very  sorry  about  Maria's  illness. 
She  really  enjoys  this  world,  and  could  defer  her  departure  to  the 
next  with  pleasure  to  herself  and  those  about  her.  You  write  your 
letter  as  cool  as  a  cucumber,  and  say  nothing  about  your  reason  for 
not  sending  it  off  on  Thursday  morning,  keeping  me  in  hot  water 
for  forty-eight  hours.  However,  '  All's  well  that  ends  well.'  I  hope 
that  this  will  be  my  last  letter  but  three.  God  bless  you  and  all  my 
dear  ones.     Best  love  to  Maria. 

"  Ever  thine  own 

"Wm.  W." 

"  New  York,  February  20,  1846. 
"  My  Beloved  William  : 

"  As  the  time  happily  approaches  for  your  leaving  New  Orleans, 
and  the  letters  by  the  Cambria  arrived  yesterday,  I  think  it  better  to 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED.  233 

write  to  you  to-night  and  to-morrow,  and  again  on  Monday,  and 
Tuesday,  instead  of  Sunday  and  Thursday,  as  before,  for,  should  you 
leave  by  the  5th  or  6th,  and  Thursday's  letter  be  even  nine  days  on 
the  road,  you  would  not  get  it  at  all.  I  shall  be  guided  afterward  in 
my  writing  by  your  letters,  telling  me  if  there  should  be  any  place  on 
the  road  where  I  could  address  you.  I  send  you  on  dear  Mary's 
letter  and  Aunt  Helen's,  and  shall  try  and  write  to  both  before  Thurs- 
day, 26th.  I  have  written  to-day  to  Dr.  Blackburn  to  save  you  do- 
ing so  when  you  come  home.  This  has  been  a  terrible  day  of  wind 
and  snow  ;  the  snow  lies  two  feet  thick  on  the  ground,  and  as  I  have 
no  more  paper  in  the  house,  and  don't  want  to  make  too  heavy  a 
postage  to  you,  I  must  be  concise. 

"  I  have  just  been  reading  over  your  letter  to  the  trio  again,  and 
did  I  not  know  how  you  hate  to  lose  your  labor,  I  decidedly  would 
not  send  it  on.  As  it  is  I  am  half  inclined  to  keep  it,  that  you  may 
read  it  again  when  you  come  home.  In  the  first  place,  it  is  far  too  long, 
and  looks  too  much  as  if  you  wanted  to  stay.  I  think,  having  formerly 
mentioned  James  Lee's  opinion  about  your  remaining,  there  was  no 
necessity  for  repeating  it,  nor  for  referring  to  what  you  wrote  to 
them  formerly  :  that  you  would  not  on  any  account  fix  yourself  in 
New  York,  and  your  being  disappointed  when  they  decided  other- 
wise. All  this  they  knew  before.  Then  you  refer  to  Sellar's  opin- 
ion about  the  necessity  of  a  superintendent  general.  Let  Sellar  give 
his  opinion  himself  if  he  think  this,  or,  if  you  think  so,  give  it  as 
your  own  opinion,  and  say  that  Sellar  thinks  the  same  very  strongly. 
You  next  tell  them  they  have  a  vast  amount  of  property  in  this  coun- 
try, which  they  also  know,  and  surely  should  think  of  such  things  for 
themselves,  and  that  it  would  be  desirable  that  one  connected  with 
them  as  you  are  should  reside  in  the  States.  This  occupies  one  page 
and  a  half.  You  then  fill  another  half  page  with  what  you  would 
do  if  you  were  not  a  family  man  ;  but,  being  a  family  man,  this 
is  out  of  the  question.  Why,  then,  write  it  ?  The  rest  of  the  page 
of  what  you  think  of  doing  with  Sellar,  and  all  the  next  page  about 
your  own  plans  should  you  undertake  the  responsibility,  are  very 
sound  and  good,  and  to  the  point.  You  next  say  your  objections 
to  remaining  another  year  and  coming  home  are  separation  from 
your  family,  seasickness,  and  that,  remaining  another  year,  you 
might  not  like  to  move  back  to  Liverpool.     This  looks  very  like 


234  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

a  dislike  to  moving  noiu  ;  the  thought  being  there  tells  a  great  deal 
of  the  inner  man.  You  next  come  out  boldly  and  strongly  and 
say  what  makes  the  three  first  pages  of  your  letter  unnecessary : 
that  you  conscientiously  think  you  should  reside  in  New  York  for 
at  least  some  years  to  come,  provided  Glasgow  and  Liverpool  could 
be  well  managed  without  you.  You  then  say  that  even  if  you  agree 
with  Sellaryour  wife  can't  yet  promise  to  remain  ;  that  you  will  be  too 
happy  to  return  and  be  rid  of  the  responsibility.  Then  you  say 
you  will  certainly  leave  the  States  with  regret,  but  if  they  wish 
you  to  stay,  you  will  bring  your  mind  to  it ;  and  then  follows  the 
cream  of  the  letter  :  that  living  in  New  York  would  be  twice  the  ex- 
pense of  living  in  Liverpool,  and  that  you  ought,  if  living  in 
New  York,  to  entertain.  All  this  is  very  true,  no  doubt,  and  ought 
to  be  considered,  but  it  looks  very  like  asking  to  stay,  and  saying  you 
ought,  but  you  wont ;  and  then  if  you  luant  me,  I  will,  but  what  will 
you  give  me  to  make  it  a?i  object  ?  Finally  you  conclude  by  saying:  '  I 
cannot  at  present  make  up  my  mind  whether  I  would  be  most  useful 
in  New  York  or  Liverpool,  but  wait  your  decision.'  Now,  to  me  all 
this  tells  the  plain  truth — you  don't  know  your  own  mind,  but  in- 
cline to  stay,  and  hate  going  home.  Excuse  plainness  from  your 
own  flesh  and  blood,  my  beloved  Will.  I  send  this  as  it  is,  that  you 
may  burn  it.  "  H. 

"  Saturday,  February  21,  1846.  My  dear  husband,  I  am  so  sorry  to 
bother  you  with  my  impertinent  opinion  of  your  letter,  but  you  know 
I  am  by  no  means  infallible,  and  you  may  be  all  right  after  all.  It 
was  so  confiding  and  lovely  in  you  to  send  on  the  letter  for  my  judg- 
ment that  I  am  inclined  to  murder  myself  for  not  approving  it  as 
I  ought.  If  I  should  keep  the  letter  till  your  return,  you  might  send 
it  on  by  the  sailing  packet,  rewritten  entirely  to  John  D.,  and  not  to  the 
trio  at  all,  telling  him  your  own  and  Sellar's  opinion,  but  that  you 
by  no  means  7vish  to  remain,  except  as  you  think  it  would  be  advisable 
for  the  business,  etc.,  and  that  your  remaining  would  involve  a  much 
greater  expense  in  living,  etc.;  but  if  he  think  with  you  that  it  is  very 
necessary,  he  had  better  propose  it  to  the  trio  in  time,  before  your 
arrangements  are  made  for  returning  ;  that  it  is  their  interests  which 
are  involved  more  than  your  own,  as  they  hold  so  much  property  here, 
therefore  it  is  they  who  are  to  decide  about  your  remaining  ;  and  that 
if  you  return  you  would  like  to  have  \ht\r  full  concurrence,  and  not 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED.  235 

have  them  think  they  can  send  you  out  here  again  at  any  time,  be- 
cause, as  a  family  man,  you  might  not  be  able  to  bring  on  all  your 
family  again,  and  you  think  you  would  not  be  doing  your  duty  to 
them  to  leave  them,  and  if  it  were  absolutely  necessary,  owing  to  the 
death  of  a  partner  on  this  side  or  other  cause,  for  someone  to  come 
out,  who  would  that  person  be  ?  would  Cross  come  out  ?  or  would 
he,  John — that  these  things  had  better  be  thought  of  before  your 
return,  for  you  think,  with  your  Trieste  jaunt  and  this  winter  at  New 
Orleans,  you  have  been  separated  enough  from  your  family. 

"  In  your  letter  to  John  you  tell  him  to  read  your  letter  to  the 
trio,  and,  if  he  approve  of  your  remaining,  to  propose  from  himself 
to  them,  as,  if  they  don't  approve,  your  letter  may  be  thought  con- 
ceited ;  therefore,  if  he  approve,  he  is  to  propose  the  thing  and  not 
show  your  letter  ;  if  he  do  not  approve  your  remaining,  then  just  to 
burn  the  letter.  Then  why  write  to  the  trio  at  all  ?  Why  not  to 
John  direct  ?  A  little  circumlocution  would  not  be  so  much  amiss 
as  in  a  business  letter,  which  ought  to  be  very  concise  and  to  the 
point.  I  will  write  you  finally  on  Tuesday  whether  I  think  it  best 
to  send  your  letter  or  not.  I  pray  day  and  night  for  guidance 
on  this  particular  matter  for  myself,  and  for  guidance  for  you, 
and  that  your  mind  and  the  minds  of  the  other  partners  may  be  so 
controlled  that  you  may  decide  what  is  best  for  the  spiritual  inter- 
ests of  ourselves  and  our  children.  To  our  children  the  whole  aspect 
of  their  future  lives  would  be  changed  either  for  better  or  for  worse  by 
their  remaining  here  or  living  in  England  ;  inuch,  much  depends  upon 
so  seemingly  small  a  matter.  Therefore,  dearest  Will,  let  us  pray 
earnestly  that  God  will  choose  our  lot  for  us,  and  direct  our  steps. 
Helen  is  greatly  better,  Willie  and  Harrie  almost  well. 

"  Thine  own  "  H." 

"  New  Orleans,  Tuesday,  February  24,  1846. 
"  My  Darling  Wife  : 

*'  This  is  Mardi  gras,  and  between  4  and  5  P.  M.  there  was  a  great 
procession  of  people  in  masks  and  all  sorts  of  absurd  dresses,  from 
St.  Louis  Street  along  Chartres  Street  to  Esplanade,  then  up  that 
and  along  Royal  to  Canal,  and  then  back  by  Conti  Street.  You 
never  saw  anything  so  grotesque  as  some  of  the  masks  and  dresses. 
The  masked  people  were  either  in   carriages  or  on  horseback,  and 


236  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

threw  flour  at  those  they  could  reach,  and  were  befloured  by  the 
spectators  in  return.  Unfortunately  it  began  to  rain  pretty  heavily 
about  4  p.  M., which  spoiled  the  fun;  had  the  day  been  clear  and  bright, 
as  well  as  warm,  there  would  have  been  a  good  deal  of  amusement, 
although  what  '  onder  airth  '  tempts  the  people  to  go  and  make 
such  jackasses  of  themselves  I  am  at  a  loss  to  conceive.  I  believe 
it  is  the  last  of  the  carnival,  and  to-morrow  Lent  begins.  Mylne 
fancies  it  is  a  relic  of  the  old  Roman  Catholic  orgies  of  which  the 
'  Abbot  of  Unreason  '  was  the  head,  an  account  of  which  is  given 
in  Scott's  '  Abbot,'  but  it  seems  to  me  that  the  revels  of  the  Abbot 
of  Unreason  and  Lord  of  Misrules  came  after  Lent,  and  was  a 
sort  of  jollification  that  the  people  treated  themselvesto  after  the 
mortification  and  penance  of  that  season. 

"  We  had  Mr.  Cruger  dining  with  us  to-day,  who  married  a  cousin 
of  his  own,  I  believe,  and  a  sister  of  your  friend  Eugene.  This  is  a 
warm,  balmy  evening  after  the  rain.  I  went  and  saw  off  Henry  Young 
and  C.  Kirkpatrick  in  the  Peytona  for  Louisville  this  afternoon  ;  I 
wished  I  had  been  going  with  them  ;  however,  I  may  reach  New 
York  nearly  as  soon  as  they  will,  although  that  is  hardly  probable. 
I  hope  all  the  dear  children  will  have  nice  new  things — that  is,  decent, 
nice-looking  clothes — when  I  come  home,  and  I  would  like  Willie  to 
have  his  hair  nicely  cut.  I  think  J.  Walter  might  take  him  down  to 
Saunders'  the  Saturday  after  you  get  this.  Don't  let  Willie's  hair 
be  cut  too  short,  but  so  that  it  will  curl  about  his  neck.  It  is  a 
great  comfort  to  see  children  nice  when  one  comes  home.  I  know, 
my  sweet  pet,  the  children  always  do  look  well  when  I  come  home, 
but  it  occurred  to  me  that  you  might  be  waiting  my  return  be- 
fore getting  spring  clothes  ;  now,  I  would  rather  you  got  the  clothes 
first,  and  consulted  me  afterward.  You  know,  I  never  saw  them  out 
in  their  new  winter  things,  and  I  would  like  to  have  a  chance  of  seeing 
their  new  spring  ones.  It's  raining  cats  and  dogs  again.  Good-night, 
sweet  love. 

"  Thursday,  February  26,  1846,  I  wrote  nothing  yesterday, 
having  been  very  busy  all  day  and  till  late  in  the  evening  writing 
about  business  matters.  Yesterday  was  a  lovely  day,  and  so  balmy 
and  warm  that  Mylne  and  I  were  out  on  the  balcony  without  our 
hats,  after  dinner,  for  half  an  hour,  and  the  thermometer  at  70^  in  the 
shade.     By  night  it   got  cool,  and  this  morning  it  was  bitter  cold, 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED.  237 

with  the  thermometer  at  45^  at  breakfast  time.  The  sun  has  since 
come  out,  but  it  is  still  very  cold.  We  have  New  York  letters  of 
i6th  inst.,  but  I  have  none  from  you  or  the  children.  You  must 
have  had  an  awful  gale  and  snowstorm  on  14th  and  15th  inst.  I 
see  that  two  ships  in  which  we  had  about  five  hundred  hogsheads 
of  sugar  have  been  lost  ;  however,  we  are  fully  covered  by  insurance, 
provided  the  New  York  insurance  offices  don't  fail. 

"  I  am  afraid  that  you  suffered  again  from  the  smoke,  but 
that  is  nothing  to  being  drowned,  as  you  might  have  been  had  you 
been  in  either  of  the  two  unfortunate  ships  above  referred  to,  out  of 
which  I  see  some  fifty  or  sixty  people  were  drowned.  The  gale 
caught  them  just  where  we  were  caught  in  the  Sultana,  but  fortu- 
nately for  us  it  was  from  northwest  instead  of  northeast. 

"  It  is  of  course  quite  uncertain  yet  what  day  I  can  leave  this,  and 
I  find  many  things  to  do  just  as  I  am  about  going.  I  hardly  think  I 
can  get  off  before  Monday,  March  9,  which  would,  if  I  get  straight 
through,  bring  me  to  New  York  on  19th  or  20th.  I  shall  not  be  able 
to  travel  as  fast  as  the  mail,  because  at  this  season  only  the  mail-bags 
are  taken  by  stage  from  Stockton  near  Mobile  to  Montgomery. 
Passengers  have  to  travel  by  steamboat  up  the  Alabama  River  to 
Montgomery,  a  forty-eight  hours'  journey.  The  stage  reaches 
Montgomery  in  twenty-four  to  thirty-six  hours.  Then,  when  I  reach 
Charleston,  if  I  find  a  gale  blowing,  I  shall  wait  till  it  moderates, 
as  the  steamers  thence  to  Wilmington  are  very  poor  craft,  and  only 
fit  for  fair  weather.  You  may  be  sure  I  will  lose  no  time  on  the  way. 
God  bless  you  and  my  dear  children,  and  unite  us  all  again  in  health 
and  happiness. 

"  Ever  thine  own 

"Wm.   W." 

"  New  York,  February  24,  1846. 
"  My  Beloved  William  : 

"  I  received  your  dear  letter  of  nth  and  12th  inst.  yesterday  at 
dinner  time,  but  was  too  unwell  to  write  that  evening,  as  I  promised 
doing.  I  had  not  been  out  for  ten  days,  except  once  to  the  House 
of  Industry,  since  Helen  was  ill,  and,  thinking  exercise  would  do 
me  good,  I  went  out  yesterday  as  far  as  Margaret  Hone's,  but  came 
home  worse.     My  back  aches  very  much.     However,  I  got  up   to 


238  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

breakfast,  and  I  am  now  lying  dressed  upon  the  sofa.  I  cannot 
ride  out  at  present,  as  no  carriage  can  go,  and  I  am  afraid  of  get- 
ting in  and  out  of  a  sleigh  ;  besides,  so  many  accidents  are  happen- 
ing every  day.  I  think  I  must  have  held  Helen  too  much  on  my 
lap  when  she  was  ill  ;  indeed,  I  know  I  did  ;  but  she  is  almost  well 
now,  and  I  have  learned  prudence.  Willie  walked  out  with  Powell 
yesterday,  and  again  to-day,  and  has  been  none  the  worse  of  it  ;  he 
looked  so  pale  and  miserable,  and  his  cough  was  quite  gone.  Helen 
coughs  a  good  deal  still,  but  has  not  a  particle  of  fever,  so  that  she 
looks  pale  and  hollow-eyed.  She  has  fallen  away  to  half  her  size, 
and  is  so  weak  she  quite  staggers.  She  was  sitting  next  me  on  the 
sofa  just  now,  and  put  her  hand  in  mine,  and  looked  up  in  my  face 
with  such  a  coaxing  look,  and  said  :  '  My  oivn  dear  manwia  ! ' 

"  Maria,  Emily,  and  Jane  Hone  have  all  been  here  this  morning. 
Emily  and  Mr.  Foster  came  to  spend  the  evening  with  me  last  night, 
and  found  me  in  bed.  It  is  a  great  comfort  to  have  kind  friends 
and  kind  faces  around  one.  Em  was  quite  hurt  and  tearful  because 
I  told  her  I  always  forgot  to  send  you  her  love  and  messages.  She 
sends  many  more  to-day.  They  are  all  going  to  a  grand  breakfast 
at  the  Racket  Club  at  2  p.  M.  to-day,  given  by  the  bachelors.  She 
brought  me  last  night  a  letter  from  dear  Cornelia,  or  rather  one  dic- 
tated by  her.  She  keeps  very  ill,  but  there  is  no  immediate  danger  ; 
but  her  faith  and  hope  and  love  are  mountain  strong.  She  desires 
to  lie  passive  in  the  hands  of  God,  to  do  with  her  as  he  will.  She 
is  willing  to  die  if  he  think  best,  or  willing  to  live  if  there  be  yet 
anything  for  her  to  do  or  suffer.  Anna  Winthrop  is  greatly  better, 
cheerful  and  happy,  singing  hymns  all  day,  and  with  tears  of  love 
to  God  and  her  fellow-men  ready  always  to  start  to  her  eyes. 
Charles  is  devoted  to  her,  and  the  children  obedient  and  affection- 
ate. All  07ir  dear  children  are  well  and  at  school.  Charlotte  is  a 
treasure,  one  even  now,  I  think,  rich  in  faith,  but  she  works  her 
mind  too  much,  and  looks  a  little  pale,  and  is  not  buoyant  enough 
in  her  spirits.  I  had  Harriet  Mills  here  to  tea  on  Saturday  for 
Charlotte,  and  have  her  very  often  here,  for  they  make  no  charge  for 
her,  I  find,  and  I  think  it  amuses  Charlotte.  Bess  is  studying  harder. 
At  her  own  request  she  was  put  into  a  higher  class  and  given  more 
to  do,  but  she  does  not  like  it  at  all.  Harriet  improves,  and  is  a 
much   better  child  generally   in   everything  ;  in  fact,  she  is  better. 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED.  239 

She  and  Bess  both  look  very  pretty,  Charlotte  and  Willie  decidedly 
ugly. 

"  I  have  read  your  letter  to  the  trio  again,  and  with  prayer.  I 
think  you  might  have  written  a  better  one,  and  I  think  it  would  have 
been  better  to  leave  it  to  them  on  the  other  side  to  propose  your 
remaining,  or,  at  all  events,  some  one  of  the  partners  on  this  side. 
Still  I  see  it  is  a  good  deal  to  the  point,  and  I  think  it  a  much  better 
letter  than  I  did  when  I  last  cut  it  up  to  you,  you  sweet  fellow.  To- 
day I  feel  more  inclined  to  send  it,  and  intend  to  write  to  John 
Yuille  along  with  this  to  come  up  to  see  me  to-morrow,  and  to  bring 
me  one  hundred  dollars,  and  I  will  get  him  to  alter  the  Per  Hibernia 
to  Cat/ibria,  and  tell  him  to  postpay  it  if  I  should  decide  on  sending 
it  ;  but  don't  you  write  to  John  Dennistoun,  saying  you  have  sent  such 
a  letter,  in  case  I  should  keep  it,  nor  do  you  write  another  to  the  same 
effect  until  after  the  sailing  of  this  steamer,  in  case  I  should  send  it. 

"  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Spencer  called  here  on  Saturday  afternoon.  They 
got  here  on  Friday,  and  go  off  to  Boston  to-day  to  sail  to  Liverpool 
per  Cambria.  Mr.  Spencer  abused  America  and  Americans  with  all 
his  heart.     Was  as  deaf  as  a  post  with  cold,  and  as  cross  as  two  sticks. 

"J.  Walter  says  Dr.  Hutton  had  a  grand  sermon  on  Sunday  upon 
peace.  The  news  by  the  Cambria  would  delight  you.  God  bless 
you,  dearest,  and  soon  reunite  us.  If  I  do  not  hear  from  you  posi- 
tively that  you  will  be  home  on  March  15,  before  Sunday,  I  will 
write  again  on  that  day  to  New  Orleans,  and  send  it  off  on  Monday, 
March  2.  I  shall  write  to  Mary  to-day,  and  Aunt  Helen  to-morrrow, 
if  I  have  time  before  J.  Yuille  comes.  The  $100  is  to  pay  another 
school  bill  till  February  23 — $95,  including  two  quarters'  music.  I 
drew  $150  before. 

"  Thine  own  "  H." 

The  Rev.  Thomas  Spencer  referred  to  in  the  foregoing  was  per- 
petual curate  of  Heaton  Charter  House,  near  Bath,  England,  and 
intimately  connected  with  the  Anti-Corn-Law  League. 

"  New  York,  Thursday,  February  26,  1846. 
"  My  Beloved  William  : 

"  I  am  greatly  disappointed  in  being  obliged  to  write  to  you  again 
before  you  leave  ;  so  much  so  that  every  time  I  awake  in  the  night 


240  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

(which  is  very  often),  and  every  time  my  eyes  open  to  the  morning 
light,  instead  of  chuckling  to  myself  that  I  may  knock  off  another 
day  from  my  list,  I  heave  a  disappointed  sigh  at  being  obliged  to 
add  five  more  to  my  list,  for  I  now  think  you  will  not  leave  New 
Orleans  till  Monday,  March  9,  and  you  cannot  possibly  reach  here 
before  19th  or  20th. 

"  I  have  your  two  dear,  precious  letters  of  February  12  and  16  ;  the 
latter  arrived  in  eight  days,  and  the  day  after  I  received  the  one  of 
February  12.  The  first  inclosed  one  to  Dr.  Blackburn,  which  was 
ludicrously  like  my  own.  /  had  written  about  Carlyle,  Vaughn's 
'  Protectorate,'  that  I  had  kept  the  papers,  etc.,  till  your  return — about 
Peel,  your  sentiments  about  the  present  crisis  of  affairs,  etc.,  etc.; 
but  as  I  had  also  written  many  other  things,  I  let  mine  go,  too, 
especially  as  it  was  well  written — a  weariness  of  the  flesh  to  write 
it,  and  I  may  not  have  another  chance  before  going  home.  I  also 
wrote  to  dear  Mary,  and  to  dear  Aunt  Helen,  atid  sent  off  your  letter 
to  John,  having  read  it  over  till  I  nearly  knew  it  by  heart,  and 
meditated  upon  it  till  I  was  half  cracked,  and  prayed  about  it  till  I 
was  ashamed  to  pray  any  more.  I  thought  that  if  you  changed 
your  mind  after,  and  decided  that  you  had  better  go  home,  you  could 
safely  lay  the  blame  upon  tne,  as  I  really  fear  I  cannot  make  up  my 
mind  to  part  Avith  you  again  to  go  across  the  Atlantic,  so  that  if  you 
go  it  must  be  without  my  consent  ;  and  as  to  your  spending  a  winter  at 
New  Orleans  without  me,  I  say  I  might  as  well  die,  or  ht  burned  for  a 
widoiv  at  once,  for  all  the  good  life  will  do  me.  I  thought  upon 
reading  your  letter  for  the  last  time  that  if  they  wanted  you  to  stay 
they  might  think  it  a  very  good  one,  but  I  read  it  always  as  the  sort 
of  knell  of  our  parting  in  July. 

"  You  will  be  pleased  to  learn  that  dear  Anna  continues  to  im- 
prove, and  her  spiritual  health  also  to  prosper.  Peace  also  among 
her  children  and  with  her  husband.  I  have  not  seen  her  for  ten  days 
or  more.  I  took  a  very  short  walk  yesterday,  and  was  none  the  worse 
for  it,  but  to-day  could  not  go  out,  as  it  was  so  piercingly  cold,  and 
I  walk  so  slowly.  Willie  went  out  with  Powell,  and  all  the  children 
went  to  school,  but  it  is  thought  the  most  severe  day  we  have 
yet  had  this  winter.  Maria  and  Em  and  Sarah  Mills  were  here  to 
see  me  this  morning,  and  John  Hone  this  evening.  I  delivered 
your  love  to  Harriet  Mills,  and  told  her  what  you  had  written  about 


CORRESPONDENCE   CONTINUED.  24I 

her  ;  she  was  too  happy.  I  received  an  invitation  to  E.  Russell 
Hone's  for  this  evening.  Maria  and  Em  are  going.  It  is  the  first 
time  she  has  entertained  in  two  years,  owing  to  the  death  of  her 
young  sister  and  her  grandmother.  I  am  better,  but  long  to  have 
you  home,  that  I  may  enjoy  your  society  before  we  part  company 
again,  perhaps  forever.* 

"  John  Walter  has  gone  to  see  how  his  aunt  Anna  is  to-night.  I 
was  singing  to  dear  Helen  to-night  a  cheerful  dancing  tune,  for  I 
was  thinking  just  then  that  in  two  days  more  the  ist  of  March  would 
be  here.  She  looked  up  with  wonder  into  my  face,  and  then  broke 
into  a  glad  smile,  and  said  :  *  Is  papa  turn  home  ? '  I  thought  it 
was  very  knowing  of  her  to  think  of  such  a  cause  for  my  gayety,  for 
with  her  illness,  my  own  ailments,  poor  Anna's  state,  and  Cornelia's, 
and  you  away,  too,  I  have  sung  nothing  but  hymns,  or  have  been 
silent  with  my  harp  upon  the  willows.  I  have  determined  to  send  this 
off  early  to-morrow  morning  (27th),  instead  of  waiting  till  Saturday 
morning  (28th),  so  as  to  be  sure  of  your  getting  it  before  you  leave 
New  Orleans,  as  you  will  no  doubt  be  anxious  about  your  letter  to 
John  D.  I  sent  for  Yuille,  and  told  him  to  postpay  it,  etc.  You  see 
that  I  am  not  without  hope  that  you  may  leave  on  the  5th  or  6th 
or  7th  prox.,  because  the  steamer's  letters  were  forwarded  to  you  on 
February  20,  and  if  you  get  them  on  March  i — nine  days — it  would 
leave  you  five  or  six  to  transact  business,  and  be  off.  I  hope  the 
news  will  be  good  news  for  you  ;  it  is  certainly  very  important  news 
politically,  but  I  trust  you  will  not  have  received  orders  to  remain 
to  open  a  new  line  of  business  on  the  strength  of  the  political  news. 
Oh  !  my  darling  husband,  how  I  long  to  see  you,  and  clasp  you  to 
my  heart  once  more.  Do  not  put  off  unnecessarily,  but  come  soon 
to  see  your  poor  wife.  I  vvill  write  to  Charleston  when  you  tell  me, 
but  no  more  to  New  Orleans. 

"  Ever  your  own,  my  beloved  Will, 

"  Harriet." 

*  I  never  read  these  three  last  words  without  a  painful  feeling,  although  I  know 
my  blessed  Harriet  only  meant  the  "  forever"  to  apply  to  this  life.  Through  the 
merits  of  our  divine  Redeemer,  I  feel  assured,  sinful  and  unworthy  as  I  am,  that 
I  shall  meet  her  at  the  right  hand  of  God.  Wm.  W. 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

ending  with  the  last  letter  ever  written  by 
wm.  w.  to  h.  a.  w. 

"  50  Chartres  Street,  New   Orleans, 

"Sunday,  March   i,   1846. 
''  My  Darling  Harriet  : 

"  I  wrote  to  you  last  on  the  26th  ult.,  and  did  not  receive  your 
letter  of  February  15-16,  covering  dear  Charlotte's  (fori  am  not  going 
to  call  her  '  Tottie  '  any  more)  of  February  14,  until  yesterday  ;  it 
was  numbered  17  ;  to-day  yours  of  iSth-ipth  ult.  came  to  hand,  also 
numbered  17.  I  am  very  sorry  to  hear  that  poor  '  little  Nell '  has  been 
so  ill,  and  you  so  anxious  and  worried  about  her.  I  hope  and  trust  it 
is  not  the  whooping  cough,  for  it  will  go  through  the  whole  of  them, 
which  would  be  too  much  for  you  in  your  present  delicate  state. 
Charlotte's  letter  of  February  14  was  very  well  written,  and  with  a 
good  deal  of  wit  in  it.  '  The  golden  cannon,  and  little  leaden 
thunderbolts '  puzzled  the  paternal  mind  for  half  an  hour,  but  at 
last  the  wit  flashed  electric  through  my  brain,  and  I  exclaimed  with 
a  loud  guffaw  :  'I  see't  noo,  I  see't  noo  !  '  like  the  stupid  old  Scot- 
tish judge  who  never  comprehended  the  witty  Henry  Erskine  until 
some  twenty  minutes  after  his  brethren  on  the  bench  had  ceased 
laughing.  I  suppose  the  seal  with  the  impression  of  a  cent  on  it 
was  meant  to  show  the  exhausted  state  of  Charlotte's  exchequer, 
and  to  obtain  my  consent  to  a  contribution  in  aid  of  the  same,  and  I 
hereby  request  that  you  will  hand  over  to  her  a  picayune,  which  she 
will  consider  as  the  '  witty  sixpence.'  Positively  she  must  not  go  on 
with  such  brilliant  flashes  or  she  will  ruin  me.  I  will  try  and  bring 
little  Nell  '  a  noo  dolly  ' — in  fact,  before  you  mentioned  it,  a  dim 
vision  of  a  possible  doll  with  a  negro  face  had  floated  across  my 
mind.  I  must  see  if  I  can  get  something  also  for  Willie,  with  his 
earache,  poor  little  fellow. 

*'  I  am  curious  to  know  what  you  will  do  with  my  letter  to  the 
trio.     I  am  rather  inclined  to  think  that  it  ought  to   go,  and,  if  it 


ENDING   WITH    LAST   LETTER   TO    H.   A.   W.  243 

do,  I  will  then,  in  the  event  of  our  going  home  bag  and  baggage, 
have  done  my  duty  to  the  utmost  in  even  hinting  at  the  possibility 
of  my  staying.  I  can't  say  I  want  to  stay  particularly.  Now  that 
Free  Trade  is  in  the  ascendant  I  want  to  be  home  ;  but,  then.  Free 
Trade  being  in  the  ascendant,  it  is,  perhaps,  more  necessary  that  I 
should  stay  ;  however,  there  is  no  use  ivriting  about  the  thing.  I 
hope  to  talk  it  over  with  you  soon,  and  I  hope  God  will  decide  what 
may  be  best  for  our  spiritual  and  temporal  welfare.  I  don't  think 
that  it  is  any  great  desire  of  being  rich  that  would  keep  me  ;  per- 
haps it's  more  the  fear  of  being  poor,  with  so  large  a  family  ;  but  the 
fear  is  much  removed,  humanly  speaking,  by  the  prospect  of  Free 
Trade,  and  when  I  am  in  the  right  frame  of  mind,  I  feel  that  God 
will  provide  for  me  and  mine  wherever  we  are,  and  I  desire  to  cast 
all  my  care  upon  him,  knowing  that  he  careth  for  me.  Ambition 
would  take  me  home,  also  religion  in  some  respects  ;  and  further,  to 
bring  up  my  children  in  a  hardier  and  more  robust  way,  mentally  and 
physically,  than  I  think  they  will  be  in  New  York.  On  the  other 
hand,  in  New  York  you  have  your  sisters.  It  is  a  pleasant,  cheerful 
place  (though,  strange  to  say,  I  rather  prefer  New  Orleans  as  a  resi- 
dence and  place  of  business),  there  are  good  schools,  and  there  is  a 
sort  of  excitement  in  driving  people  helter-skelter  here  and  there,  and 
even  in  being  driven  at  high  pressure  one's  self.  If  we  go  home  to 
Liverpool  bodily,  I  shall  feel  planted  there,  as  it  were,  and  the  only 
move  a  move  out  feet  foremost  to  some  detestable  cemetery,  at  Low- 
hill,  or  elsewhere,  with  miserable  stunted  trees,  and  shrubs  begrimed 
with  soot,  instead  of  the  noble  forest  trees  and  fine  healthy  sea  breeze 
which  one  would  have  in  a  similar  predicament  at  Greenwood, 
besides  having  a  chance  of  an  occasional  visit  from  Maria,  when  she 
brought  some  strangers  to  see  the  place.  Her  want  would  be  the 
converse  of  Sterne's  when  he  went  to  '  drop  a  tear  at  the  tomb  of 
the  lovers,  and  found  no  tomb  to  drop  it  on.'  She  would  easily 
enough  find  the  tomb,  but  the  tear  would  not  be  forthcoming,  cheer- 
ful witch  that  she  is  ! 

"  The  glorious  news  by  the  Cambria  (February  4)  reached  me 
yesterday  by  express,  and  to-day  letters  came  forward.  I  have  one 
from  John,  one  from  Cross,  and  one  from  Joe  Greaves  ;  none  from 
Mary  or  Anna.  I  consider  the  Free  Trade  measure  proposed  by  Sir 
Robert  Peel  as  a  great  triumph,  and  we  now  see  the  abolition  of  the 


244  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Corn  Laws  certain  in  Februar)^,  1849,  and  in  the  meantime  the  duty 
reduced  one-half.  Indian  corn,  buckwheat,  pork,  beef,  etc.,  all  duty 
free  at  once,  and  all  wheat  grown  in  the  colonies  duty  free  at  once. 
It  is  very  pitiful  in  Peel  putting  off  the  total  abolition  for  three 
years,  and  I  am  not  without  hopes  that  Cobden  and  the  League  may 
force  him  to  immediate  as  well  as  total.  John  Dennistoun  writes 
me  that  Peel  is  certain  to  carry  his  measure  in  the  House  of  Com- 
mons by  a  large  majority,  and  also  through  the  Lords.  I  did  not 
write  any  part  of  my  letter  yesterday,  as  I  was  excessively  busy,  and 
did  not  quit  the  office  till  about  9  p.  m.  I  will  be  very  busy  all  the 
time  I  am  here,  and  know  not  yet  whether  I  will  be  able  to 
leave  this  on  Thursday,  5th,  or  Monday,  9th  inst.  I  don't  want  to 
leave  on  a  Friday (!).  I  had  enough  of  that  the  last  time  I  left 
this. 

"  I  went  to  Dr.  Scott's  this  morning,  and  had  an  excellent  sermon 
on  the  text  :  '  For  other  foundation  can  no  man  lay,'  etc. — i  Cor. 
iii.  II.  Afterward  I  partook  of  the  Lord's  Supper.  The  day 
was  fine,  and  I  felt  thankful  that  my  sojourn  here  was  nearly  over, 
and  pleasantly  over.  The  hymns  were  pretty  and  the  music  good, 
and  if  I  did  not  make  much  melody  with  my  voice,  I  tried  my  best, 
both  with  it  and  my  heart.  I  had  '  a  time  of  refreshing  from  the 
Lord.'  There  was  a  lady  baptized  in  the  church  prior  to  her  reception 
as  a  member.  It's  odd  how  little  affects  one  sometimes  ;  a  little  boy 
went  up  to  the  pulpit  steps  to  say  something  to  Dr.  Scott  before 
sermon,  and  placed  his  hand  on  Dr.  Scott's  arm  in  a  very  confiding 
way  while  he  spoke  to  him  ;  there  was  something  in  the  group  thus 
formed  that  brought  the  tears  to  my  eyes  :  the  boy  seemed  to  look 
with  such  entire  confidence  to  Dr.  Scott.  I  suppose  it  was  this  con- 
fiding look  that  moved  me.  I  did  not  go  this  evening,  as  a  Dr. 
Witherspoon  was  to  preach,  whom  I  did  not  like,  so  I  have  probably 
been  in  Dr.  Scott's  church  for  the  last  time.  I  have  very  agreeable 
associations  connected  with  it.  It  seems  to  me  that  I  have  been 
fully  more  under  the  influence  of  religion  there  than  in  Mr.  Kelly's, 
although  I  don't  like  Scott's  preaching  so  much  as  his. 

"  This  has  been  a  lovely  day.  Murray  T.  and  I  took  a  walk  down 
the  river  as  far  as  the  convent.  The  weeping  willows  are  quite 
green,  almost  in  full  leaf,  and  all  the  other  trees  bursting  out. 
Peaches  are  in  full  blossom.     The  day  has  been   very  warm,  but  it 


ENDING   WITH    LAST   LETTER   TO    H.   A.    W.  245 

is  cool  again  this   evening.     Good-night.     God  bless  you    and  all 
my  dear  ones,  and  unite  us  again  in  health  and  happiness. 

"  P.  S. — Monday,  March  2,  1846.  Your  excellent  letter  of  Feb- 
ruary 20,  covering  a  delightful  one  of  same  date  from  dear  Char- 
lotte, and  two  most  kind  ones  from  Mary  and  Aunt  Helen,  has  just 
arrived  this  morning.  Your  critique  on  my  letter  to  the  trio  is  most 
just,  and  makes  me  feel  like  a  scalded  cock.  Imagine  what  you  call  a 
'  rooster '  clapping  his  wings  and  crowing,  and  the  cook  pouring  a  ket- 
tle of  boiling  water  on  the  '  puir  brute.'  I  am  the  '  rooster,'  you  are  the 
cook  ;  and  I  wish  now  that  you  may  not  have  sent  the  letter  forward, 
so  that  I  may  alter  it  in  conformity  to  your  notions.  This  shows 
that  I  ought  always  to  be  near  you  to  have  counsel  and  advice. 
However,  I-  did  say  to  John  that  I  originally  intended  the  letter 
to  go  direct  to  the  trio.  Perhaps,  also,  although  you  have  all 
the  '  pros  '  and  '  cons  '  fully  in  your  mind,  the  trio  may  have  for- 
gotten them.  If  you  have  forwarded  the  letter,  good  and  well  ;  per- 
haps it  is  just  as  well  that  it  should  go,  with  all  its  imperfections  on 
its  head.  I  shall  be  saved  the  trouble  of  concocting  another.  If 
it  have  not  gone,  why,  it  will  also  be  well  ;  we  can  then  talk  the 
matter  fully  over  when  we  meet.  I  did  not  read  the  business 
letters  yesterday,  and  so  did  not  then  know  how  many  things  I  might 
have  to  think  of  before  leaving.  I  don't  think  now  I  will  be  able 
to  get  away  before  Monday,  9th  inst.,  and  I  would  reach  home 
just  as  soon  by  not  leaving  till  Tuesday,  loth  inst.,  as  the  Mobile 
boats  (at least  the  good  ones)  leave  for  Montgomery'not  on  Tues- 
days, but  on  Wednesdays,  so  if  I  left  on  Monday  I  might  have  to 
stay  one  day  in  Mobile.  I  may  yet  be  ready  to  leave  on  Thursday, 
but  I  don't  think  it.  I  am  in  a  terrible  hurry  and  bustle  this  morn- 
ing, and  scarcely  know  whether  my  head  or  my  heels  are  uppermost. 
Sellar  has  just  arrived  back  from  Attakapas,  and  Pelton  with  him. 
I  am  sorry  not  to  be  able  to  say  to  a  day  when  I  shall  be  home, 
but  I  expect  from  15th  till  20th  inst.  I  shall,  if  spared,  write  you 
again  on  Thursday,  5th  inst.,  whether  I  leave  that  day  or  not,  but  I 
hardly  think  I  will  get  away  before  Monday,  9th,  or  Tuesday,  loth 
inst.  Keep  up  your  spirits  and  pray  that  we  may  all  meet  in  health 
and  happiness.     God  bless  you  all. 

"  Ever  thine  own 

"Wm.  W." 


246  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

Addressed  to  Charleston,  S.  C.  : 

"  New  York,  Tuesday  Night,  March  3,  1846. 
"  My  Beloved  William  : 

"  I  have  such  a  craving  and  hankering  after  the  pleasure  of  writ- 
ing to  you  that  I  cannot  wait  until  Wednesday  and  Thursday,  the 
days  I  had  intended  writing,  instead  of  Friday,  the  jth,  your  day, 
for  I  have  such  a  delicious  corner  of  hope  in  my  heart  that  if  I 
wait  till  Saturday,  8th,  before  sending  off  my  letter,  you  would  not 
get  it  till  after  you  reach  home,  and  I  do  not  want  you  to  miss 
hearing  from  me  on  the  way  home.  I  wrote  you  on  Wednesday, 
February  25,  and  sent  off  the  letter  to  New  Orleans,  telling  you 
about  my  final  determination  about  the  letter  to  John,  which  //as 
gone.  Since  then  I  received  yours  of  19th  in  eight  days  ;  it  reached 
me  on  Friday,  27th,  just  as  I  was  going  into  bed  ;  so  I  returned  to 
the  parlor  fire,  and,  locking  the  door,  read  it  over  twice  to  my  very 
great  satisfaction.  You  say  in  that  letter  that,  if  the  steamer's  letters 
arrived  by  the  4th,  you  will  be  here  before  the  i8th  or  19th.  I  am 
sure  you  would  get  them  by  the  2d,  so  I  am  hoping  to  get  you  in 
my  arms,  my  dear.,  dear  fellow,  on  Sunday,  15th,  at  dinner  time,  or 
Monday,  i6th  ;  but  I  won't  be  too  sure  till  I  get  yours  of  March  2, 
which  will  probably  tell  me  of  the  steamer's  arrival,  and,  oh  !  woe  is 
me  if  there  be  anything  in  these  letters  to  detain  you  ! 

"  Emily  Hosack  was  here  this  morning  about  ten  o'clock,  and  Em 
Foster  and  Maria  about  eleven.  I  went  out  a  very  little  way  to 
walk,  but  it  is  so  slippery,  and  the  snow  so  deep,  I  cannot  manage 
it.  Mrs.  Bedell  Avas  here  also  to-day,  and  Julia  Mills.  These  all 
got  in.  Yesterday  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Hutton  called  ;  very  pleasant 
people.  He  says  he  has  called  four  times  before  ;  I  only  heard  of 
otice.  I  sent  for  Whitman  to-night  to  hear  Dr.  Detmold's  answer. 
I  can  have  the  room  on  the  15th,  but  Whitman  had  never  till  now 
told  of  our  engaging  it  for  April  i.  Here  I  stop,  as  my  back  aches 
furiously,  and  Charlotte  wants  to  say  a  word  for  herself.  God  bless 
mine  own  dear  husband  with  a  sweet,  sound  sleep. 

"  Wednesday  Evening,  March  4, 1846.  Well,  dear  Will,  I  am  much 
better  to-night. 

'  Thursday,  March  5.  Here  Julia  Mills  came  in,  and  stayed  till 
near  10  p.  m.  ;  so  I  could  write  no  more.   She  had  been  saying  all  winter 


ENDING   WIPH    LAST   LETTER   TO   H.    A.   W.  247 

that  she  was  coming,  and  as  the  time  was  drawing  near  for  your  re- 
turn, I  thought,  if  she  did  not  come  now,  she  might  think  it  her 
duty  to  come  when  you  returned,  so  I  pressed  the  matter  upon 
her,  and  sa.id  you  would  be  at  home  before  she  had  been  near  me  ; 
this  stirred  her  up,  and  last  night  she  came.  Yesterday  I  went  with 
Maria  and  Em  to  see  Eliza  Kane,  who  has  been  unwell  for  three 
weeks.  We  could  not  see  her,  but  saw  Mrs.  Douglas  Cruger  instead. 
I  could  scarcely  creep  round  to  Tenth  Street,  and  when  I  got  to 
Eliza's,  had  to  sit  down  on  the  steps,  but  got  home  safely.  It  has 
begun  to  thaw,  and  to-day  is  lovely,  so  that  I  shall  venture  out 
again  to-day.  Eliza  was  very  kind  ;  begged  me  to  let  her  come  round 
and  sleep  with  me  any  time  I  felt  lonely  ;  if  she  could  do  me  no 
good,  it  might  be  a  comfort  to  have  a  grown  person  beside  me, 
ready  to  help  me  if  necessary,  or  to  keep  me  company  if  wakeful  ; 
and  if  I  would  like  it,  she  would  come  over  every  night  after  tea,  and 
sleep  with  me,  till  your  return.  She  said  she  was  going  to  send  me 
blanc  mange,  or  jelly,  to  tempt  me  to  eat,  but  I  said  the  only  complaint 
I  had  was  getting  too  much.  Helen  is  quite  well  again,  and  stronger, 
but  pale  ;  I  dare  not  yet  trust  her  to  go  out.  Don't  forget  her  dolly- 
"  God  bless  you,  my  precious  husband,  and  spare  us  both  to  meet  in 
health  and  true  happiness.  I  have  not  heard  from  Cornelia  lately. 
Anna  not  quite  so  well. 

"Thine  own  devoted  "  H." 

"  New  Orleans,  Thursday,  March  5,  1846. 
"  My  Darling  Wife  : 

"  The  mail  failed  yesterday,  and  again  to-day,  so  I  have  nothing 
later  from  you  than  when  I  last  wrote,  and  know  not  whether  you 
have  forwarded  my  letter  to  John  D.  When  I  wrote  on  Monday,  I 
thought  it  would  be  impossible  for  me  to  leave  to-day,  but  I  '  set  a 
stoot  heart  to  a  stey  brae,'  worked  like  a  beaver  myself,  and  made 
everyone  else  do  the  same.  And  so,  thank  God,  I  am  ready  to  start 
to-day  at  4  p.  M.  for  Mobile,  and  go  by  the  same  steamer  that  takes 
this.  But  I  shall  probably  be  detained  a  day  at  Mobile,  as  the  best 
steamers  for  Montgomery  leave  there  on  Saturday  ;  then,  besides 
that,  the  mail  beats  the  steamers  on  the  Alabama  River  by  twenty- 
four  hours,  so  that,  if  this  meet  with  no  detention,  it  ought  to  reach 
New  York  two  days  before   I   shall,  even  if  I  am  not  detained  by 


248  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

bad  weather  in  Charleston.  If  I  have  a  chance,  I  will  write  to  you 
on  the  road,  but  very  possibly  this  will  be  the  only  epistle  you  will 
get  before  I  see  you.  Won't  you  regret  that  ?  I  have  got  through 
with  all  my  business,  and  feel  in  good  health  and  spirits.  The 
weather  is  lovely  and  there  is  a  fine  moon  for  night  traveling.  God 
has  specially  blessed  me  hitherto,  and  I  trust  he  will  crown  all  his 
mercies  by  uniting  us  all  together  again  in  health  and  happiness. 
Sellar  is  here  but  sails  for  Cuba  this  week.  God  forever  bless  you 
and  all  my  darlings. 

"  Ever  thine  own  "  Wm.  W."  * 

*June  2,  1892.  How  little  did  I  think  when  I  closed  the  above  letter  that  it 
was  the  last  I  would  ever  write  to  my  blessed  Harriet,  or  of  the  heavy  blow  which, 
was  impending  over  me  in  her  death  on  April  17,  1846. 


CHAPTER   XIV. 

MY    WIFE    DIES. 

Having  finished  my  last  letter  from  New  Orleans  on  March  5, 
1846,  I  now  copy  from  my  journal  an  account  of  my  journey  to,  and 
arrival  in,  New  York  : 

"Mobile,  March  6,  1846.  Left  New  Orleans  yesterday  at  5  p.  m., 
and  had  a  smooth,  pleasant  passage  to  this  place.  T.  Sellar  and 
Pelton  dined  with  us  at  New  Orleans.  After  dinner  Mylne,  Murray, 
and  Sellar  accompanied  me  to  Lake  Pontchartrain.  I  arrived 
(Mobile)  at  noon  to-day.  Was  introduced  by  Mylne  to  Mr.  Edmon- 
stone  of  Charleston,  who  went  that  distance  with  me.  He  and  I 
left  at  5.30  p.  M.  by  Norma  for  Montgomery,  where  we  arrived  at 
2.30  p.  M.  on  Sunday,  March  8.  I  slept  on  a  shake-down  on  the 
floor  of  a  very  dirty  stateroom  on  board  the  Norma,  Edmonstone 
having  a  four-posted  bed.  We  had  a  very  quiet,  nice  passage  ;  only 
one  drunken  man,  and  not  a  card  seen  during  the  passage  ;  on  the 
other  hand,  a  good  many  tracts  lying  about,  and  to-day  we  had  a 
sermon  from  a  Methodist  minister,  who  had  a  good  face  and  good 
voice.  He  read  the  io6th  Psalm  ;  then  we  all  sang,  he  leading, 
'  Plunged  in  a  gulf  of  dark  despair,'  etc.  The  sermon  was  on  the 
text  '  For  the  Lord  is  a  sun  and  a  shield.'  The  preacher  had 
considerable  fluency  of  language,  but  not  much  to  the  purpose,  al- 
though his  doctrine  was  good  and  his  prayers  short  and  good.  We 
all  went  down  on  our  knees.  In  his  sermon  he  said  :  '  A  young 
lady  who  had  been  deaf  and  dumb  from  her  birth  attended  a  camp 
meeting  in  the  back  parts  of  Virginia,  and  became  anxious  for  her 
soul,  and  when  all  were  praying  for  her  her  tongue  was  loosed 
and  she  cried  distinctly  :  "  Glory  !  Glory  !  Glory  to  God  !  "  ' 
This  was  decidedly  '  too  much  pork  for  a  shilling.'  Excepting  this 
it  gave  me  great  pleasure  to  worship  God  in  a  steamer  on  the  Ala- 
bama River,  and  to  see  such  an  attentive  audience,  and  so  great  a 
change  from  the  gambling  and  dissipation  of  nine  or  ten  years  ago. 

"  Monday,  March  9.     Left  Montgomery  for  Chehaw,  forty  miles 

249 


250  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

by  railway,  at  8  a.  m.  Dined  at  Chehaw  at  12.30  P.  M.,  and  left  it  per 
stagecoach  at  i  p.  m.  Supped  at  Cussetah  at  11.30  p.  M.  The  stage 
upset  about  midnight,  six  miles  from  Lagrange.  All  the  passengers 
more  or  less  hurt,  except  myself.  A  Cherokee  Indian  very 
badly  cut  about  the  right  eye,  two  other  gentlemen  had  their 
heads  cut  and  contused,  and  Edmonstone  got  his  side  hurt.  We 
had  changed  stages  only  two  miles  before  the  accident,  and  the  new 
one  had  all  the  side  curtains  fastened  down.  I  rolled  up  the  cur- 
tain next  to  me,  and,  when  the  coach  upset,  I  jumped  through  the 
vacant  space  like  a  cat,  and  was  on  the  upper  side  of  the  coach,  and 
outside,  almost  as  soon  as  we  upset.  Fortunately  the  horses  re- 
mained quiet.  The  moon  was  up,  but  the  night  was  hazy.  We  all 
joined  in  raising  the  coach,  and  then  drove  on  to  Lagrange,  where  we 
left  the  Indian  and  another  gentleman  who  was  hurt,  as  well  as  four 
Indians  who  were  in  the  other  coach,  which  was  not  upset,  but  who 
were  frightened,  and  moreover  wanted  to  remain  with  their  wounded 
companion.  These  five  Indians  were  going  as  a  deputation  to 
Washington.  All  the  country  is  covered  with  peach  trees  in 
blossom. 

"Tuesday,  March  10.  Arrived  at  Atlanta,  the  beginning  of  the 
Georgia  Railroad,  at  5  p.  m.,  and  dined  there.  We  got  berths  in  the 
cars  on  which  we  could  stretch  ourselves,  and,  with  my  plaid  for  a 
pillow,  I  got  some  sleep.  The  roads  to-day  before  we  reached 
Atlanta  were  awful,  and  we  sunk  sometimes  up  to  the  axle  of  the 
stage  in  red  clay. 

"  Wednesday,  March  11.  Reached  Augusta,  Ga.,  about  4.30  A.  M., 
and  went  to  the  Globe  Hotel  ;  washed  and  dressed  ;  then  in  an 
omnibus  crossed  the  Savannah  River  by  a  fine  bridge  to  Hamburg, 
where  the  South  Carolina  Railroad  begins.  Sta'rted  at  6  A.  M.,  and 
stopped  at  Aiken,  about  twenty  miles  from  Hamburg,  to  breakfast. 
Country  fiat  and  swampy.  Met  Dr.  Buckman,  the  naturalist,  on  the 
train.  Arrived  at  Charleston  at  1.30  p.  M.  Called  at  Mitchell  & 
Mure's,  and  got  my  letter  from  Harriet  ;  called  also  at  John  Fraser 
&  Co.'s  office,  but  they  had  all  gone  home  to  dinner.  Sailed  per 
Governor  Dudley  at  2.30  p.  M.;  weather  stormy  and  looked  as  if  it 
would  be  worse.  From  Montgomery  to  Charleston  the  country  cov- 
ered at  every  homestead  with  peach  trees  in  blossom.  The  Governor 
Dudley  proved  a  better  sea  boat  than  I  expected,  and  although  we 


MY   WIFE   DIES.  25  I 

had  a  heavy  sea  and  a  good  deal  of  wind,  we  proceeded  on  our 
voyage.     I  went  to  bed  at  6  p.  m. 

"  Thursday,  March  12.  Arrived  at  12  noon  at  Wilmington,  N. 
C,  and  started  immediately  for  Weldon  per  railway  ;  dined  at 
Goldsborough,  N.  C,  and  reached  Weldon  about  midnight. 

"  Friday,  March  13.  Arrived  at  Richmond,  Va.,  about  7  a.  m., 
having  stopped  from  3  to  5  a.  m.  at  Petersburg,  Va. ;  we  breakfasted 
at  Richmond,  and  thence  by  rail  to  Acquia  Creek  on  the  Potomac, 
and  from  there  by  a  very  nice,  clean  steamer  up  the  Potomac  to 
Washington.  We  passed  close  under  Mount  Vernon,  Washington's 
house,  a  respectable-looking,  old-fashioned  mansion,  of  two  stories, 
with  pillars  in  front,  and  standing  on  high  ground,  with  some  fine 
old  trees  about  it,  overlooking  the  Potomac.  The  fore-deck  of  the 
steamer  was  literally  piled  up  with  fine  fresh  striped  bass,  rock  fish, 
etc.,  etc.,  just  caught  with  a  seine-net  in  the  Potomac.  When  we 
arrived  at  Washington,  there  was  great  crowding  to  get  into  the 
omnibus  which  took  us  to  the  railway  station.  We  left  Washing- 
ton about  5  p.  M.,  and  in  the  car  were  old  Mr.  Isaac  Bell  and  his 
daughter  Mary  ;  arrived  at  Baltimore  at  9  p.  m.,  and  Philadelphia 
about  3  A.  M.,  March  14. 

"Saturday,  March  14.  Left  Philadelphia  about  7  a.  m.,  after 
remaining  there  nearly  four  hours,  breakfasted  at  the  Walnut  Street 
House  on  the  wharf,  crossed  to  Camden,  and  thence  by  rail,  passing 
Joseph  Bonaparte's  house  at  Bordentown  [I  saw  him  in  his  gar- 
den either  at  this  time  or  previously],  and  soon  to  Perth  Amboy, 
where  we  got  on  board  the  steamer  Independeiice,  and  thence  through 
the  Kills.  We  landed  Mr.  Bell  and  Miss  Mary  at  New  Brighton, 
near  which  place  he  had  a  fine  large  house,  looking  on  the  Kills. 

"I  arrived  at  New  York  at  1.30  p.  m.,  in  8  days  20^  hours  from 
New  Orleans  ;  but,  allowing  for  difference  of  longitude  i  hour,  in  8 
days  19^  hours.  I  stopped  7  hours  at  Mobile,  and  17  hours  at 
Montgomery,  therefore  my  traveling  time  was  only  7  days  19^  hours. 
I  went  first  to  the  office  in  Wall  Street  ;  the  day  was  rainy  and  dis- 
mal, and  the  melting  snow  was  piled  in  the  middle  of  Broadway,  in  a 
continuous  row,  three  feet  deep.  I  arrived  at  the  New  York  Hotel 
about  2.15  p.  M.,  and  found  Margaret  Hone  with  my  dear  Harriet, 
dressing  up  the  children  for  some  play  they  were  going  to  enact. 
And  so  ended  my  travels.     God  be  thanked  for  all  his  mercies. 


252  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"March  19,  1846.  Went  Avith  William  and  Bleecker  Neilson  and 
a  Mr.  Weeks  to  see  the  House  of  Refuge  for  Juvenile  Delinquents. 
It  is  situated  on  the  New  York  side  of  the  East  River,  and  the 
building  was  originally  a  fever  hospital.  It  is  now  extremely  well 
ventilated  and  very  clean.  There  were  about  260  boys  and  60  girls. 
I  don't  think  that  over  one-tenth  of  the  boys  were  black  and  none 
of  the  girls.  The  superintendent  is  a  Mr.  Wood  ;  he  told  me  he 
saw  no  difference  either  in  intellect  or  morals  between  the 
white  and  black  boys  ;  he  thought  the  latter  less  tricky,  and  that 
they  did  not  combine  and  plot  together  so  much  as  the  white  boys. 
All  the  boys  and  girls  are  under  eighteen.  The  black  boys  are  not 
so  steady  as  the  white  boys  when  bound  out  as  apprentices.  There 
is  a  great  demand  for  the  boys  as  apprentices,  but  little  or  none  for 
the  girls.  The  juveniles  are  all  taught  reading,  writing,  and  arith- 
metic ;  they  have  also  manual  training.  The  boys  make  chairs, 
razor-strops,  pocketbooks,  etc.  The  girls  sew  and  make  the  boys' 
clothes,  which  fully  occupies  their  time.  The  girls  and  boys  are 
entirely  separated.  Both  boys  and  girls,  with  few  exceptions, 
appear  to  me  to  have  bad  expressions,  the  girls  especially  ;  they 
seemed  to  have  countenances  not  unlike  the  insane  inmates  of  Han- 
well  near  London,  so  that  there  may  be  a  closer  connection  between 
disease,  mental  and  bodily,  and  crime  than  one  at  first  would  sup- 
pose. The  sources  of  support  of  the  institution,  which  is  managed 
by  a  private  society,  are  : 

"  By  Corporation  of  New  York  City  per  annum,      .         .         .  $4,000.00 

Tax  on  Theater  Licenses,      ...           ....  3,000.00 

Portion  of  Commutation  Tax  on  Foreign  Passengers,    .         .  3,500.00 

Proceeds  of  Industry  of  the  Juvenile  Delinquents,   .        .         .  6,000.00 

$16,500.00 

"  The  superintendent  has  rooms  for  himself  and  family  in  the 
house,  and  the  run  of  the  house  provisions,  with  $1200  per  annum 
salary.  There  is  a  large  swimming  bath  for  the  boys,  with  shower 
bath  ;  they  go  in  forty  at  a  time,  summer  and  winter  ;  the  bath 
room  is  large,  and  heated  by  steam.  There  are  excellent  airy 
schoolrooms  and  well-ventilated  workshops. 

"The  juveniles  are  committed  for  vagrancy,  or  any  crime,  or 
simply   for  being   abandoned  by   their   parents.     A  history    of   all 


MY   WIFE   DIES.  253 

persons  admitted  is  taken  down  from  their  own  lips,  as  well  as  all 
circumstances  regarding  them  which  may  transpire  on  their  exam- 
ination before  the  court,  and  after  they  leave  the  institution  any 
authentic  notices  of  them  are  recorded  in  its  books.  Many  turn 
out  well,  and  boys  who  have  been  educated  there  are  now  mates 
and  commanders  of  ships,  and  some  of  the  girls  are  well  married. 

I   heard   one'  curious   history    of    a    girl,    Maria ,  seduced   by 

her  half  cousin,  a  brothel  keeper,  and  then  sent  to  the  institution. 
He  was  prosecuted  by  the  society,  imprisoned,  and  fined,  and  she 
is  now  the  wife  of  a  merchant  in  Utica.  Dined  with  William  and 
Caroline  Neilson.     Extras  out  with  English  news  till  March  4. 

"  Friday,  March  20.  Received  letters  from  Cross  and  Anna  of 
March  3,  and  from  Mary  of  February  27.  My  impression  is  that 
John  D.  will  decide  that  we  shall  go  home. 

"  Thursday,  March  26.  [Note. — Here  comes  a  page  and  more  of 
statistics  about  the  cost  of  laying  down  wheat  in  New  York  from 
Illinois,  and  a  statement  that  it  would  require  seventy-five  cents  per 
bushel  to  pay  the  Illinois  farmer  the  cost  of  raising  it.  Then  a 
statement  about  Indian  corn  ;  the  best  and  most  cultivated  is  from 
the  "  gourd  seed,"  and  then  I  write]  :  One  of  the  largest  farmers 
in  the  West  says  all  the  profit  he  wants  is  to  sell  his  corn  on 
his  farm  at  121^  cents  per  bushel,  which  exactly  corroborates  what 
President  Polk  told  me.  [Of  course  these  statistics  of  forty-six 
years  ago  are  worth  nothing  now  (1892),  as  rates  have  entirely 
changed  owing  to  the  facilities  afforded  by  railroads,  none  of  which 
existed  west  of  Buffalo  in  1846.] 

"April  13,  1846.  Yesterday  was  my  beloved  Harriet's  thirty- 
sixth  birthday.  I  went  in  the  evening  to  attend  the  organization 
of  a  new  Congregational  church,  to  be  called  the  Church  of  the 
Puritans.  Of  this  Dr.  Cheever  is  to  be  the  minister.  I  suppose 
it  is  to  be  a  sort  of  rival  of  Grace  Church  ;  as  the  latter  is  all  for 
the  rich,  so  the  Church  of  the  Puritans  is  to  be  for  rich  and  poor, 
especially  for  the  poor  ;  for  '  to  the  poor  the  Gospel  is  preached.' 
I  liked  their  declaration  of  faith,  and  could  bid  them  God-speed, 
only  I  think  the  '  meetinghouse '  of  the  Puritans  would  have  been 
a  more  appropriate  name  for  their  building  than  the  Church  of  the 
Puritans.  They,  no  doubt,  intend  the  latter  epithet  to  be  applied 
to  the  society^  but  society  will  apply  it  to  their  building. 


254  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

New  York  paper  of  Saturday,  April  i8,  1846  : 

"  DIED. 

"  On  Friday  afternoon,  April  17,  Harriet  Amelia,  wife  of  William 
Wood,  Esq.,  of  Liverpool,  and  daughter  of  the  late  John  Kane 
The  relatives  and  friends  of  the  family  and  those  of  Frederic  De 
Peyster  are  invited  to  attend  the  funeral  from  the  residence  of  the 
latter,  No.  88  University  Place,  on  Sunday  afternoon  next  at  4.30 
o'clock." 

In  the  Telegraph  newspaper  of  April  20,  1846,  appeared  the  fol- 
lowing obituary  : 

"  We  notice,  with  great  regret,  the  death  on  Friday  last  of  Harriet 
Amelia,  wife  of  William  Wood,  Esq.,  of  Liverpool,  daughter  of  the  late 
John  Kane,  Esq.,  of  this  city.  This  beautiful  and  interesting  lady 
will  long  be  lamented  by  a  numerous  circle  of  friends." 

FROM    DIARY. 

"Saturday,  April  18,  1846.  Since  my  last  entry  in  this  book 
(April  13,  1846)  the  heaviest  of  earthly  calamities  has  befallen  me. 
I  have  lost  my  souVs  best  beloved,  my  blessed,  blessed  YI'3lXX\q\..  She  fell 
asleep  in  Jesus  yesterday  (April  17)  at  6  p.  m. 

**  On  Monday,  April  13,  she  took  a  drive  with  her  sister,  Maria  De 
Peyster,  which  she  enjoyed,  and  was,  as  usual,  looking  lovely  and 
blooming  when  I  came  home  at  four  o'clock.  In  the  evening  of 
that  day  Maria  and  her  husband  spent  a  very  pleasant  evening  with 
us,  and  Harriet  Mills  was  also  here.  My  darling  wife  and  I  went  to 
bed  about  10  p.  m.,  and  by  her  desire  we  prayed  together  at  her 
bedside  before  retiring  to  rest.  About  4  a.  m.  on  April  14  she 
roused  me  and  I  went  for  Dr.  Berger  and  the  nurse.  At  10  minutes 
to  7  A.  M.  on  Tuesday,  April  14,  a  large  stout  boy,  with  thick  black 
hair  on  his  head,  as  all  the  rest  of  my  children  have  had,  was 
born.  His  dear  mother  had  decided  to  call  the  child,  if  a  son, 
Alexander  Dennistoun,  after  Uncle  Alick.  I  had  proposed  Fred- 
eric De  Peyster  or  Alexander  Dennistoun,  and  she  chose  the 
latter.  I  remained  at  home  all  Tuesday,  and  she  was  remarkably 
well  and  in  good  spirits,  and  nursed  the  baby  for  the  first  time  about 
10  p.  M.     She  had  a  good  night,  and   next  morning  looked  bright 


MY   WIFE   DIES.  255 

and  well.  Dr.  Berger  came  and  saw  her  at  9  a.  m.  Wednesday, 
15  th,  and  said  she  was  remarkably  well,  and  her  pulse  like  a  young 
lioness.  I  went  down  to  the  office  about  10.30  a.  m.  She  said  :  '  Now, 
mind,  Will,  Dr.  Berger  is  out  of  the  way  to-day,  and  you  are  going 
away,  too.'  I  said  I  should  be  back  early,  and  was  back  by  3  p.  m., 
an  hour  earlier  than  usual,  but  was  detained  a  quarter  of  an  hour 
longer  than  I  expected  looking  at  some  Sea  Island  cotton  of 
Charles  Easton's  going  consigned  to  A.  Dennistoun  &  Co. 

"  When  I  came  home,  I  found  my  blessed  wife  in  a  high  fever. 
She  had  begun  to  feel  it  about  11  a.  m.,  and  got  alarmed  and  sent 
for  Dr.  Berger.  He  was  not  to  be  found,  but  Dr.  Trudeau,  Berger's 
son-in-law,  came  in  his  place.  By  the  time  I  came  home  Dr.  Berger 
had  got  there.  When  I  took  Harriet's  hand,  she  said  :  '  O  Will, 
why  did  you  leave  me  ? '  I  said  I  would  not  have  left  if  I  had  had 
the  slightest  idea  she  was  not  doing  as  well  as  it  was  possible  to 
desire  ;  but,  having  delayed  writing  a  letter  to  New  Orleans  for  a 
day  in  order  to  remain  at  home,  I  thought  it  as  well  not  to  put  off 
writing  for  two  days. 

"  I  should  have  said  that  about  10  a.  m.  on  Tuesday  she  had  symp- 
toms which,  I  recollect,  she  thought  worse  than  Dr.  Berger  would 
admit  them  to  be.  Applications  of  ice  were  made,  and  were  appar- 
ently efficacious. 

"  When  I  sat  down  by  her  bedside  on  Wednesday,  April  15,  at  3.30 
p.  M.,  I  asked  her  if  she  would  like  me  to  repeat  anything  to  soothe 
her,  and  asked  if  she  would  like  '  Ye  nymphs  of  Solyma,'  and  she 
said  :  '  No,  not  that.'  I  then  said,  "  Shall  it  be  '  All  thoughts,  all  pas- 
sions, all  delights,'  "  etc.,  merely  meaning  to  repeat  something  that 
would  put  her  to  sleep,  but  she  said  reproachfully:  '  How  can  you 
ask  to  repeat  that  just  now  ?'  I  said  I  only  wanted  to  send  her  to 
sleep,  so  I  thought  it  would  not  have  mattered  what  I  repeated.  I 
then  felt  sure  that  she  thought  herself,  and  was,  seriously  ill.  I 
repeated  to  her  '  Let  Christian  faith  and  hope  dispel  the  fears  of 
guilt  and  woe,'  and  '  Where'er  I  turn,  on  every  side,  my  guilt,  O 
Lord,  I  see.'  I  sat  up  all  Wednesday  night  with  her,  occasionally 
lying  down  in  my  dressing  gown  on  the  outside  of  the  bed.  She 
was  very  feverish  all  night,  and  I  repeatedly  rubbed  her  back  with 
laudanum  and  camphor.  Thursday,  April  16,  I  was  with  her  all 
day,  and  read  the  Bible  and  prayed  with  her  ;  but  my  head  is  rather 


256  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

confused  about  Thursday.  I  know  I  was  often  out  and  in  of  the 
room,  and  Dr.  Berger  called  in  a  Dr.  Delafield  as  consulting  phy- 
sician, which  made  me  see  she  was  in  danger.  However,  I  had  still 
full  hope.  Thursday  night  about  nine  Dr.  Berger  came.  She  had  a 
sinking  pulse.  He  stayed  most  kindly  with  me  till  1  a.  m.,  and  gave 
her  laudanum,  etc.,  but  she,  dear  creature,  tossed  about  and  could 
get  no  rest.  I  gave  her  fifteen  drops  of  laudanum  after  Berger  left, 
making  forty-five  in  all,  and  she  had  some  sleep  from  5  till  7  a.  m., 
but  she  had  suffered  greatly  in  her  breathing,  and  all  this  time  she 
did  not  seem  to  recognize  me,  or  to  speak,  but  when  I  asked  her  if 
she  were  in  much  pain,  she  said  no. 

"  When  the  two  physicians  returned  at  10  a.  m.,  Friday,  17th,  Dr. 
Berger  told  me  he  still  had  hope,  but  that  the  probabilities  were 
against  her  recovery.  I  was  with  her  all  day,  and  she  kept  gradually 
sinking,  and  breathing  as  if  her  breath  were  caught  painfully.  Dr. 
Berger  came  back  about  2  p.  M.,  and  I  saw  he  considered  her  case 
hopeless  by  his  ordering  her  some  arrowroot  and  brandy.  She  took 
a  little  and  it  revived  her  slightly,  but  she  soon  sunk  again.  He 
then  ordered  her  a  little  brandy  and  water,  but  this  had  little  effect. 
I  sent  for  John  Walter  and  Charlotte,  and  asked  my  blessed  wife  if 
she  knew  me.  She  opened  her  large,  lovely,  kind  eyes,  and,  gazing 
at  me,  said  :  'Know  you!  of  course  I  do,' and  she  squeezed  my 
hand.  She  laid  her  hand  on  John  Walter's  head  and  blessed  him, 
and  also  dear  Charlotte.  She  saw  and  recognized  Bessie,  Harrie, 
and  Willie,  who  all  kissed  her.  I  asked  her  if  I  should  bring  Helen, 
but  she  said  :  '  No  j  I  know  that  dear  little  Helen  would  be  fright- 
ened.' I  asked  her  if  she  felt  assured  hope  and  confidence  in  God, 
and  if  she  felt  his  presence  with  her  in  this  her  last  trial  ;  she  said  : 
'  Yes,  I  do.'  I  said  :  '  God  will  be  with  us,'  to  which  she  replied  : 
*  He  will,'  and  her  look  indicated  that  she  felt  assured  '  he  would.' 
I  asked  her  to  pray  to  God  for  us.  She  gazed  upon  me  with  fond 
affection,  and  fixed  her  eyes,  which  truly  looked  angelic,  on  my  face. 
At  last,  with  her  right  hand  in  mine  and  the  other  in  John  Walter's, 
she  breathed  her  last  about  6  p.  m.  No  struggle,  no  convulsion,  a 
simple  cessation  of  breathing.  For  about  five  minutes  before  this 
her  eyes  were  directed  right  up  to  heaven,  and  had  a  most  serene 
and  heavenly  expression,  as  if  they  entered  into  '  that  within  the  veil ' 
and  saw,  like  Stephen,  Jesus  sitting  at  the  right  hand  of  God.     She 


MY   WIFE   DIES.  2$/ 

had  so  often  talked  to  me  about  how,she  would  look,  and  had  feared 
that  she  might  look  ugly,  I  was  rejoiced  she  looked  so  beautiful  in 
death.  I  never  saw  anything  so'calm  and  beautiful  as  she  looked 
when  laid  out.  I  put  her  dear  head  in  the  coffin  last  night  (Friday, 
April  17),  and  this  morning  (i8th),  before  breakfast,  I  had  it  screwed 
down  and  sealed  it,  that  no  one  might  see  any  change,  but  might 
have  the  same  impression  that  in  life  and  death  she  was  lovely  in 
body,  and,  oh  !  how  lovely  in  mind. 

"  All  our  friends  have  been  kind  to  us  at  this  trying  time,  Maria 
and  De  Peyster  peculiarly  so.  De  Peyster  has  arranged  all  about 
the  funeral,  and  John  Walter  and  I  and  he  went  over  to  Green- 
wood Cemetery  to-day  (Saturday,  April  18)  to  select  a  plot 
of  ground  where  to  bury  my  blessed  wife.  I  have  chosen  one 
with  four  trees  overarching,  and  with  a  view  out  to  the  ocean, 
on  the  summit  of  what  is  called  Ocean  Hill,  so  that  when  in 
England  I  may  think  she  is  on  the  shore  of  the  sea,  only  separated 
by  it  from  me.  I  suppose,  however.  Ocean  Hill  is  a  mile  or  two 
inland.  She  and  I  walked  past  the  very  place  last  autumn  ;  I  think 
early  in  October.  Who  would  have  thought  that  my  next  visit 
would  be  to  select  a  grave  for  my  soul's  darling  ?  Dear  Maria  De 
Peyster  has  been  with  the  children  all  day.  After  dinner  Dr.  Hut- 
ton  called,  and  I  asked  him  to  baptize  little  Alexander,  which  he 
did  in  a  most  feeling  and  affecting  way  ;  the  children,  Maria,  Powell, 
and  Mrs.  Anthony  were  present.  About  8.20  p.  m.  to-day  the 
undertaker  came  to  remove  the  coffin  to  Mr.  De  Peyster's  house, 
from  whence  the  funeral  takes  place  to-morrow  (Sunday,  April  19), 
Before  my  darling's  remains  left  I  read  to  John  Walter,  Charlotte, 
and  Bessie  her  last  will  or  letter  of  advice.  Oh  !  how  excellent  it  is, 
so  Christian,  so  sensible  and  judicious,  and  so  like  herself  ;  so  con- 
soling from  the  pure  and  fervent  Christianity  which  it  breathes.  It 
is  dated  March  25,  1846,  and  was  given  to  me  that  day.  God  grant 
I  may  fulfill  her  will  in  spirit,  as  she  says,  and  as  near  the  letter  as 
God  may  see  fit.  I  prayed  with  the  three  dear  children  before  the 
coffin  left.  As  it  was  dark,  I  drove  upon  the  box  of  the  hearse  to 
Mr.  De  Peyster's,  and  there  left  till  to-morrow  in  Maria's  care  the 
remains  of  that  dear,  blessed  wife  whom  I  got  from  Maria's  house 
on  September  15,  1830,  when  I  married  her,  now  15  years,  7  months, 
and  3  days  ago.     She  died  15  years,  7  months,  and  2  days  after  our 


258  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

marriage.  O  God  !  grant  me  patience  and  resignation  after  this 
heavy,  heavy  trial.  I  am  now  writing  this  in  our  dining  room,  158 
New  York  Hotel,  where  we  have  so  often  sat  together.  The  children 
have  all  gone  to  bed.  She  died  in  bedroom  No.  160.  My  blessed, 
blessed  Harriet !  Oh,  how  I  loved  her  !  and  how  sweet  and  kind 
a  guide  and  counselor  she  has  ever  been  to  me.  Now  she  is  with 
the  blessed  spirits  around  the  throne  of  God,  and,  it  may  be,  even 
now  watching  over  me  and  our  dear  children. 

"I  left  my  marriage  and  engagement  rings  on  the  third  finger  of 
her  left  hand  ;  the  former  was  too  small  to  come  off  easily,  even  if 
I  had  wanted  it,  but  I  liked  the  idea  of  still  being  bound  to  her, 
although  she  is  in  heaven  and  I  upon  earth.  It  almost  appears  folly 
to  write  this  that  I  have  written.  No  words  can  express  my  love 
and  admiration  of  her,  but  I  thought  I  might  like  to  remember 
about  the  last  illness  of  my  dearest, 'or  our  children  might  (I  love  to 
call  them  our),  and  so  have  put  down  the  foregoing  while  fresh 
in  my  mind. 

"  A  letter  arrived  to-day  from  Cross,  but  I  have  not  opened  it, 
not  wishing  to  have  my  thoughts  distracted  about  business  at 
present. 

"Oh,  heavenly  Father,  guide  and  direct  me  in  all  my  paths 
through  this  life,  and  especially  in  regard  to  bringing  up  our  dear 
■children  in  thy  nurture  and  admonition  above  all  things,  as  their 
dear  mother  and  I  have  so  often  prayed.     Amen  ! 

"  Sunday,  April  19,  1846.  After  breakfast  to-day  I  desired  Char- 
•lotte  to  teach  the  two  children,  Harriet  and  Willie,  while  Helen  sat 
on  my  knee,  and  J.  Walter  and  Bessie  on  the  sofa,  as  their  dear 
mother  taught  them.  She  accordingly  expounded  to  them  the  last 
■chapter  of  Luke,  and  by  God's  blessing  did  it  beautifully.  We  then 
had  all  much  pleasant  religious  conversation  together,  and  really  '  a 
time  of  refreshing  from  the  Lord.' 

"At  II  A.  M.  Mr.  De  Peyster's  carriage  came  for  us,  and  I  and 
the  five  eldest  children  went  to  his  house  to  spend  the  day  before 
my  blessed  wife's  funeral.  We  had  all  much  pleasant  religious 
conversation,  reading  of  hymns,  and  talking  of  my  beloved.  It  is 
most  soothing  and  delightful  to  hear  how  her  lovely  Christian  char- 
acter was  appreciated  by  all  her  friends.  I  felt  all  this  day  that  God 
was  with   me    and    mine  of  a    truth,   supporting   and  comforting  us 


MY   WIFE   DIES.  259 

according  to  his  gracious  promise.  I  said  to  Maria  that  if  I  died  I 
would  like  to  leave  my  children  under  her  charge,  and,  failing  her, 
Emily  Foster's.  She  said  she  would  be  most  delighted  to  take 
charge  of  them.  I  said  that  unless  some  extraordinary  revolution 
happened  there  was  enough  settled  on  them  to  educate  them  well, 
viz.: 

"  I:i  money  settled  on  them  and  Harriet,        .....     ;^4000 
Insured  on  my  life,  and  not  liable  for  my  debts,       .         .         .  3500 


^7500 
Insured  on  my  life,  but  liable  for  my  debts,  .  .  .         2000 


.^9500 


"This  was  very  delightful  for  me  to  know,  and  it  seemed  to  me  all 
of  a  sudden  that  I  ought  to  stay  in  //2/i' country  for  my  dear  children's 
sake,  and  also  for  my  own,  to  be  near  my  Harriet's  remains,  so  that 
when  it  pleases  God  to  take  me  home  where  now,  indeed,  my 
earthly  as  well  as  my  heavenly  treasure  is,  the  mortal  part  of  me 
may  be  laid  beside  her. 

"  When  the  relatives  and  friends  began  to  assemble,  I  went  into 
the  back  bedroom  with  Maria,  J.  Walter,  Charlotte,  Emily  Foster, 
and  John  Hone,  and,  by  the  bye,  I  read  my  blessed  Harriet's  will  to 
Maria  and  Em,  and  the  former  read  part  to  Anna  Winthrop  and 
Jane  Hone.  John  Hone  was  allowed  to  read  the  whole,  as  my  dar- 
ling wife  looked  upon  him  as  a  son.  The  lady  relatives  were  in  the 
front  bedroom,  the  gentlemen  who  came  to  the  funeral  were  in  the 
parlor  and  in  Mr.  Weeks'  house  next  door,  Mr.  De  Peyster's  not 
being  able  to  hold  them  all.  Among  them  were  the  venerable  Chan- 
cellor Kent,  a  cousin  of  Harriet's  father,  Philip  Hone,  Sam  How- 
land,  etc.,  etc.,  and  most  of  the  leading  people  in  New  York.  The 
pall-bearers,  who,  it  seems,  must  not  be  relatives,  were  :  James  F. 
De  Peyster,  Charles  H.  Russell,  William  Waddington,  B.  F.  Daw- 
son, Charles  A.  Clinton,  Samuel  S.  Howland,  Thomas  Parker, 
George  T.  Elliot. 

"  The  coffin  was  carried  shoulder  high  along  the  west  side  of  Uni- 
versity Place  and  part  of  Washington  Square,  from  whence  it  crossed 
into  Dr.  Hutton's  church,  through  the  center  door,  and  we  walked 
up  the  middle  aisle,  the  coffin  being  placed    in  front  of  the  pulpit. 


26o  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

I  sat  on  a  bench  at  its  head,  the  rest  of  the  people  behind.  The 
whole  church  and  galleries  seemed  to  be  full  of  ladies  and  gen- 
tlemen. The  organ  first  played,  and  the  choir  sang  an  anthem, — 
'  Blessed  are  the  dead  that  die  in  the  Lord,' — after  which  Dr. 
Hutton  read  many  beautiful  verses  from  the  Bible,  of  which  he  has 
given  me  a  copy.  Then  old  Dr.  Knox,  in  whose  church  (Collegiate 
Dutch  Church)  Harriet  sat  when  a  child,  prayed,  then  Dr.  Hulton 
gave  us  a  blessing,  all  very  appropriate  and  soothing,  and  I  think 
my  blessed  Harriet  would  have  liked  the  respectful  order,  decency, 
and  good  taste  of  the  whole  thing.  We  then  had  the  coffin  put 
into  the  hearse,  and.  a  few  near  friends  followed  it  up  Fourth  Street 
into  Broadway,  and  down  Broadway,  where  she  had  so  often  walked 
in  all  her  youthful  beauty,  and  down  which  she  and  I  had  driven  as 
far  as  Niblo's  on  Saturday  evening,  nth  inst.,  little  thinking  how 
our  next  drive  down  it  would  be.  I,  J.  Walter,  Willie,  Mr.  De  Pey- 
ster,  and  John  Hone  were  in  the  first  carriage,  immediately  after 
the  hearse.  We  crossed  the  South  Brooklyn  Ferry  ;  the  evening 
was  beautiful.  It  was  strange  to  be  carrying  her  in  her  coffin  to  the 
very  point  where  we  landed  so  full  of  happiness  on  August  12, 
1844,  from  the  Queen  of  the  West. 

"  We  arrived  at  Greenwood  Cemetery  about  7  p.  m.,  and 
reached  Ocean  Hill,  where  the  grave  is,  about  half  past  seven.  I 
touched  the  coffin  just  as  it  was  lowered  down.  There  are  three 
black  seals  on  it  at  the  hinge,  sealed  with  my  little  seal.  It  was  getting 
quite  dark  before  I  left,  and  Philip  Hone  said  I  had  better  come  away. 
And  there  I  buried  Harriet  !  to  rest,  at  least  the  mortal  part  of 
her,  till  the  Resurrection  morning,  when  I  presume  her  blessed  spirit 
will  be  again  united  to  her  lovely  body,  that  lovely  casket  which 
first  attracted  me  to  the  priceless  jewel  within.  She  is  now  a  happy 
and  blessed  spirit  before  the  throne  of  God,  where  I  hope  through 
the  atoning  blood  of  Christ  my  Saviour  to  join  her  in  his  good  time. 

"  We  drove  home  from  Greenwood  and  left  Willie  at  the  New  York 
Hotel,  and  J.  Walter  and  I  went  with  Mr.  De  Peyster  to  his  house, 
where  we  had  tea  ;  he  kindly  walked  home  with  Charlotte,  Bessie, 
John  Walter,  and  me.  I  then  read  Jay  to  the  children,  and  so 
ended  my  blessed  Harriet's  funeral  day.  I  have  been  wonderfully 
supported,  and  have  had  strong  proof,  if  such  had  been  wanting,  that 
she  and  I  have  not  followed  'cunningly  devised  fables.'" 


CHAPTER   XV. 

CONTAINS  Harriet's  last  counsels  to  me  as  expressed  in  her 

WILL. 

"Monday,  April  20,  1846.  Awoke  very  early  and  'communed 
with  my  heart  upon  my  bed.'  After  breakfast  began  to  put  things 
in  order,  write  up  the  house  book,  etc.,  etc.,  look  over  some  of  my 
darling  wife's  papers.  Mr.  De  Peyster  came  in  and  brought  me  Jacob 
Harvey's  note  expressing  his  sympathy  in  very  strong  terms,  also  a 
slip  cut  from  the  Telegraph  newspaper,  which  I  have  quoted  above. 

"Although /never  shall  forget  my  blessed  Harriet's  lovely  character, 
let  me  now  jot  down  for  the  benefit  of  her  younger  children  the  follow- 
ing traits  :  She  was  very  lively  and  full  of  fun,  but  innocent  fun, — not 
a  particle  of  sarcasm, — very  witty,  and  could  write  off  poetry  almost 
as  fast  as  prose  when  she  chose  to  do  so.  She  had  the  most  angelic 
temper,  yet  firm  and  decided  when  she  thought  it  necessary  to  be  so. 
Although  it  is  much  to  say  of  a  human  being,  I  do  think  she  was 
totally  devoid  of  selfishness.  In  all  our  married  life  of  fifteen 
years  and  seven  months  I  never  saw  a  single  instance  of  it.  She 
always  loved  to  make  those  around  her  happy,  and  had  a  particular 
knack  in  interesting,  pleasing,  and  teaching  children,  and  never  got 
out  of  patience  with  them.  With  great  general  kindliness  of  feeling, 
she  had  deep,  deep  affection  for  those  she  loved.  Her  face  was  the 
very  mirror  of  truth  and  candor.  Her  eyes  large  grayish  blue  of  the 
most  intellectual  sort,  yet  full  of  kindness  and  love,  long  black  eye- 
lashes, and  the  most  beautiful  delicately  penciled  eyebrows  ever  seen 
on  human  face.  Her  nose  of  the  Grecian  sort,  her  brow  high  and  beau- 
tifully white,  and  her  cheeks  finely  shaped  and  always  with  a  beautiful 
tinge  of  rose  color  ;  her  lips  full,  and  though  her  mouth  was  not 
large,  it  was  larger  in  proportion  than  the  rest  of  her  features.  Her 
ears  were  small  and  very  beautiful,  and  her  head  had  most  delicate 
shape;  her  hair  a  beautiful  fine  glossy  black,  not  a  gray  hair  in  it 
when  she  died,  and  when  young,  and  when  she  was  first  married,  she 
used  to  wear  it  in  natural  ringlets,  and  although  latterly  she  braided 

261 


262  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

it,  she  had  only  to  pass  it  over  her  finger  to  make  it  curl  beautifully. 
Her  teeth  were  very  white,  and  as  her  lips  were  always  a  little  parted, 
they  were  a  noticeable  part  of  her  face.  She  had  a  lovely  neck  and 
shoulders,  with  a  skin  like  driven  snow;  a  beautiful  figure,  with  a  very 
small,  trim  foot  and  ankle  :  I  could  always  span  her  ankle  with  my 
hand.  She  was  altogether  a  perfect  Hebe  in  her  appearance  and 
shape,  and  the  pure  and  blessed  spirit  within  was  far  more  beautiful 
even  than  the  temple  which  contained  it,  lovely  as  that  was.  She  was 
taken  from  me  in  the  very  prime  of  her  matronly  beauty,  having  just 
completed  her  thirty-sixth  year  on  April  12. 

"  '  Encompassed  in  an  angel's  form 
An  angel's  spirit  lay.' 

"  Her  appearance  to  the  last  was  graceful  and  youthful ;  she  did 
not  look  over  twenty-five.  Oh  !  what  words  can  tell  her  character; 
she  was  the  very  ideal  of  a  perfect  Christian  lady.  God  only  knows 
what  I  shall  do  without  her.  Oh  !  may  he  supply  her  place  to  me 
and  the  children,  and  lead  us  and  guide  us  in  the  way  she  walked, 
and  at  last  receive  us  all  unto  himself,  there  to  be  forever  united  with 
her  in  singing  the  praises  of  the  Lamb.  The  last  time  she  was  able 
to  go  to  church  was  Sunday,  March  29  ;  she  walked  with  me  to  Dr. 
Hutton's  dressed  in  her  jet-black  silk  frock,  India  shawl,  and  white 
satin  hat  trimmed  inside  with  pink,  and  she  never  looked  more  lovely. 

"  To-night  Dr.  Knox  called  and  sat  a  few  minutes;  he  knew  Harriet 
as  a  child  and  all  her  father's  family  ;  thirty-one  years  ago  there 
were  nine  of  them,  and  the  father  and  mother  alive,  and  all  in  great 
prosperity,  and  now  only  three  left. 

"  I  have  had  a  sore  time  of  it  to-day  ;  my  bereavement  seems 
heavier  than  I  can  bear.  I  have  arranged  all  her  letters  I  got  in 
New  Orleans.  John  Hone  called  in  the  evening  and  did  me  good  ; 
so  did  De  Peyster  and  Emily  and  Foster.  I  got  the  deed  for  the 
'  parcel  of  ground  '  at  Greenwood  ;  it  cost  me  one  hundred  dollars* 
O  God,  grant  me  patience  and  resignation  under  thy  chastening 
hand,  and  keep  me  from  driving  away  my  melancholy  by  returning 
to  business,  but  may  I  *  hear  the  rod,  and  who  hath  appointed  it.' 

"  Wednesday,  April  22.  Yesterday  I  got  the  European  letters 
till  4th  inst.,  all  quite  pleasant,  although  I  had  expected  very  dis- 
agreeable ones.     John  D.  and  all  want  me  home,  but  I  feel  that  I 


HARRIET'S   LAST   COUNSELS   TO   ME.  263 

cannot  go  for  good,  at  least  at  present.  All  the  children,  even 
Bessie,  want  now  to  stay  here.  My  present  idea  is  to  go  home 
myself  in  July,  and  return  here  October  4,  and  make  arrangements 
for  remaining  here.  I  engaged  Mrs.  Anthony  from  May  25  till 
November  i,  at  twelve  dollars  per  month,  to  take  charge  of  the  baby. 
"  Thursday,  April  23.  Writing  to  Anna.  Then  Maria  De  Peyster 
came,  and  we  got  the  most  of  my  blessed  wife's  clothes  arranged, 
the  rest  to  be  done  to-morrow  morning.  Among  my  papers  I 
found  the  following  written  in  pencil.  Harriet  scribbled  it  off  the 
day  we  landed  from  the  Queen  of  the  West,  August  12,  1844,  and  had 
flung  it,  I  recollect,  in  the  fire  at  Glen  Cove,  and  I  snatched  it  out 
when  partially  burned. 

"  'Oh'!  gallant  Captain  Woodhouse — Captain  Phil, 
I'm  asked  to  sketch  thy  portrait,  and  I  will. 
An  honest  tar,  with  weather-beaten  face, 
Whose  pleasant  features  might  a  landsman  grace  ; 
A  voice  of  thunder,  and  a  heart  of  steel 
Where  danger  is — and  yet  that  heart  can  feel 
For  steerage  woes,  and  lend  a  timely  aid 
To  those  whom  want  or  hunger  have  dismayed. 
The  infant  prattles  on  his  friendly  knee, 
No  fear  at  that  now  gentle  voice  hath  he, 
While  all,  both  young  and  old,  admire  the  skill 
With  which  he  guides  the  helm,  brave  Captain  Phil. 
And  now  the  passengers  our  notice  claim  ; 
We'll  introduce  them  here  to  you  by  name. 
There's  Cook  and  Gregg,  two  merchants  from  one  town. 
And  "  Longman,"  with  his  coat  of  dingy  brown, 
And  lazy  gaping  mouth,  which  never  shuts 
Unless  to  crack  stale  jokes  and  hazel  nuts  ; 
An  owner  of  poor  slaves  is  he,  and  one 
Who  ' '  larrups  his  own  niggers  "  all  for  fun  ! 
A  contrast  here  is  Guenther,  mild  and  good, 
To  whom  the  little  birds  look  up  for  food  ; 
And  Kennedy,  whose  gentlemanly  ways 
Will  cause  the  most  censorious  to  praise. 
There's  Wagaman,  the  doctor,  Willcox,  Smith, 
And  Pearson,  who  makes  up  just  the  fifth 
Of  ciphers  in  this  budget  nice  of  mine, 
On  whom  I  cannot  waste  another  line. 
There's  Carcasson,  a  sort  of  monkey  man, 
*  Whose  gambols  make  us  laugh,  refrain  who  can. 


264  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

There's  Southgate,  missionary,  there's  Brodhead,  too, 

Esteemed  by  all,  though  favorite  of  few  ; 

And  yet  the  Woods,  who  know  the  matter  best, 

Say  J.  R.  Brodhead  is  worth  all  the  rest. 

Next  come  the  family  of  Woods,  but  here 

I  pause  and  hesitate,  and  somewhat  fear 

To  trumpet  forth  the  praises  that  are  due, 

To  such  a  family — so  pass  on  to 

Our  noble  ship,  of  packet  ships  the  best.' 

"  My  darling  one  could  write  such  verses  as  the  above  as  quickly 
as  prose. 

"  Tuesday,  April  28.  Fourteen  days  to-day  since  my  blessed 
Harriet  was  confined.  On  Friday  last,  24th  inst.,  Tom  Kane 
arrived  from  Philadelphia  to  see  me  ;  he  is  a  very  kind  little  fellow 
and  his  society  has  cheered  me.  On  Sunday,  26th  inst.,  Tom  Sellar 
arrived  from  Cuba  via  Charleston,  much  sunburned,  but  stout  and 
well.  He  did  not  hear  of  dear  Harriet's  death  till  he  arrived  at  the 
hotel.  On  Monday,  27th,  I  went  with  Maria  De  P.  to  Staten  Island, 
and  engaged  rooms  and  board  for  myself  and  the  children  at  Miss 
Morris',  New  Brighton.  I  read  to  Sellar  after  I  came  home  the  latter 
part  of  Harriet's  will,  where  she  gives  her  confession  of  faith,  and 
to-day  I  read  it  to  Tom  Kane.  I  hope  it  may  be  blessed  to  both. 
It  seems  to  me  I  feel  her  loss  more  and  more.  God  give  me  grace 
to  submit  humbly  and  even  cheerfully  to  his  will.  I  wrote  to-day 
to  the  trio  anent  my  plan  of  staying  here. 

"  April  29,  1846.  Dr.  Hutton  gave  me  last  Sunday  a  copy  of  the 
verses  from  the  Bible  which  he  read  at  my  blessed  Harriet's  funeral. 
They  are  as  follows  : 

"  '  Come,  and  let  us  return  unto  the  Lord  :  for  he  hath  torn,  and  he 
will  heal  us  ;  he  hath  smitten,  and  he  will  bind  us  up.' 

" '  The  Lord  also  vvill  be  a  refuge  for  the  oppressed,  a  refuge  in 
times  of  trouble.' 

"  '  He  hath  not  despised  nor  abhorred  the  affliction  of  the  afflicted  ; 
neither  hath  he  hid  his  face  from  him  ;  but  when  he  cried  unto  him, 
he  heard.' 

"  '  Cast  thy  burden  upon  the  Lord,  and  he  shall  sustain  thee.' 

" '  The  Lord  will  not  cast  off  forever  :  but  though  he  cause  grief, 
yet  will  he  have  compassion  according  to  the  multitude  of  his  mercies. 
For  he  doth  not  afflict  willingly  nor  grieve  the  children  of  men.' 


HARRIET'S   LAST   COUNSELS   TO    ME.  265 

"  *  All  things  work  together  for  good  to  them  that  love  God.' 

"  '  Mark  the  perfect  man,  and  behold  the  upright  :  for  the  end  of 
that  man  is  peace.' 

" '  Precious  in  the  sight  of  the  Lord  is  the  death  of  his  saints.' 

"  '  The  day  of  death  is  better  than  the  day  of  one's  birth.' 

"  '  The  righteous  shall  enter  into  peace.' 

"  '  There  the  wicked  cease  from  troubling  ;  and  there  the  weary  be 
at  rest.     There  the  prisoners  rest  together.' 

"  *  The  righteous  hath  hope  in  his  death.'   [And  what  a  hope!  W.  W.] 

"*We  know  that,  when  Jesus  shall  appear,  we  shall  be  like  him; 
for  we  shall  see  him  as  he  is.' 

"  '  I  go  to  prepare  a  place  for  you  .  .  .  that  where  I  am,  there 
ye  may  be  also.' 

"  '  We  know  that  if  our  earthly  house  of  this  tabernacle  were 
dissolved,  we  have  a  building  of  God,  an  house  not  made  with  hands, 
eternal  in  the  heavens.' 

"  '  Blessed  are  the  dead  which  die  in  the  Lord  from  henceforth  : 
Yea,  saith  the  Spirit,  that  they  may  rest  from  their  labors;  and  their 
works  do  follow  them.' 

"  '  Knowing  that  He  which  raised  up  the  Lord  Jesus  shall  raise  up 
us  also  by  Jesus.' 

"'Who  shall  change  our  vile  body,  that  it  may  be  fashioned  like 
unto  his  glorious  body,  according  to  the  working  whereby  he  is  able 
even  to  subdue  all  things  unto  himself.' 

"  '  They  shall  walk  with  me  in  white  :  for  they  are  worthy.' 

"  '  They  shall  hunger  no  more,  neither  thirst  any  more  ;  neither  shall 
the  sun  light  on  them,  nor  any  heat.  For  the  Lamb,  which  is  in  the 
midst  of  the  throne,  shall  feed  them,  and  shall  lead  them  unto  living 
fountains  of  waters:  and  God  shall  wipe  away  all  tears  from  their  eyes.' 

"'I  saw  no  temple  therein  :  for  the  Lord  God  Almighty  and  the 
Lamb  are  the  temple  of  it.  The  city  had  no  need  of  the  sun,  neitlier 
of  the  moon,  to  shine  in  it  :  for  the  glory  of  God  did  lighten  it,  and 
the  Lamb  is  the  light  thereof.' 

'"Then  shall  the  righteous  shine  forth  as  the  sun  in  the  kingdom 
of  their  Father.' 

"  And  here  is  a  fitting  place  to  insert  my  best  beloved's  will  of 
March  25,  1846  : 


266  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"'New  York,  March  25,  1846. 
"  *  My  Beloved  Husband  : 

"  '  At  your  request  I  sit  down  to  express  to  you  some  thoughts  and 
wishes  respecting  our  dear  children  and  yourself  in  the  form  of  a 
will,  though  if  in  all  things,  as  circumstances  arise,  you  ask  God  to 
direct  you,  I  have  710  will  respecting  either  them  or  yourself  but 
your  will,  guided  by  your  excellent  natural  common  sense,  after  hav- 
ing "  committed  your  way  "  unto  our  heavenly  Father  by  earnest, 
fervent  prayer,  waiting  for  his  answer,  and  trusting  in  his  promise 
that  he  "  will  direct  your  paths."  Having  written  to  you  many  let- 
ters, as  you  know,  in  the  form  of  a  will  previous  to  my  confinements, 
and  finding  many  reasons  after  for  altering  my  opinions  and  wishes, 
it  leads  me  greatly  to  distrust  my  own  judgment,  for  in  all  things  we 
must  be  guided  by  the  new  events  and  circumstances  constantly 
arising  in  our  everyday  history,  and  you,  my  beloved  William,  must 
not  go  by  the  letter  of  this  will,  but  by  the  spirit. 

[Passages  relating  to  J.  Walter  Wood  are  omitted  by  his  desire. — 
E.  D.  Kane.] 

"  '  Our  dear  Charlotte  has  irritable  nerves  and  an  anxious  disposi- 
tion. She  must  guard  against  a  fretful  temper,  and  cultivate  cheer- 
fulness and  a  contented  mind.  She  is  too  fond  of  neglecting  reading, 
or,  when  she  reads,  of  reading  story  books,  a  sort  of  unnatural  appe- 
tite far  from  wholesome,  while  the  reading  of  other  books,  such  as 
travels,  history,  or  biography,  strengthens  the  mind  and  makes  many 
a  weary  hour  pass  pleasantly  and  profitably.  It  would  be  at  once  a 
safeguard  against  the  habit  of  fretfulness  and  wandering  from  one 
trifling  thing  to  the  other,  without  plan  or  object  but  to  get  rid  of 
time  that  is  hanging  heavy  on  her  hands.  Will  my  dear  Charlotte 
attend  to  this  matter  for  her  own  sake  and  for  her  mother's  ?  She 
should  not  be  allowed  to  study  too  hard  at  school,  or  for  school,  any 
more  than^^w  should  apply  yourself  too  closely  to  business.  Both  her 
bodily  and  mental  health  suffer  by  it.  The  mental  suffering  shows 
itself  in  this  peevishness  and  irritability  before  spoken  of,  and  the 
bodily  suffering  by  her  looks,  headaches,  and  disordered  stomach. 

"  '  Even  dear  Bessie  needs  much  overlooking  and  watching  respect- 
ing the  books  she  gets  hold  of  ;  though  fond  of  wholesome  reading, 
she  has  a  great  or  greater  craving  for  trashy  stories  from  annuals  or 
newspapers,  as  bad  for  the  mind  as  novel  reading,  and  creating  a 


HARRIET'S   LAST   COUNSELS   TO    ME.  267 

disrelish  for  useful  and  healthful  reading,  which  is  unprofitable  and 
useless,  is  an  abuse  of  God's  gifts,  injurious  to  the  mind  and  reason 
he  has  given  us  for  his  own  purpose,  and  a  waste  of  that  time  and 
leisure  which  are  also  a  gift  from  him,  to  be  used,  and  not  abused. 
Of  course  I  would  not  prohibit  an  occasional  perusal  of  a  fictitious 
work,  as  some  of  them  are  not  only  good  in  themselves,  but  relax  the 
mind  and  amuse  for  a  time  from  more  serious  duties  ;  but  I  would 
prohibit  irregular  and  promiscuous  reading  of  story  books  and  silly 
authors.  Will  my  dear  husband  see  and  provide  good,  useful,  and, 
at  the  same  time,  interesting  and  instructive  books  for  these  dear 
children,  as  faithfully  as  he  would  provide  food  for  the  body  ?  Don't 
encourage  the  writing  of  poetry  in  dear  Charlotte  ;  an  occasional 
hymn  or,  if  she  be  in  the  humor  for  it,  a  frolicsome  piece  she  may 
indulge  in,  but  she  is  too  excitable  to  try  to  be  a  poetess. 

"  '  Let  Harriet  be  carefully  guarded  from  flattery  and  from  silly 
young  companions  ;  she  is  already  thoughtless  and  vain.  May  God 
guard  her  from  the  temptations  which  surround  her  !  Willie  and 
Helen  are  yet  tender  and  innocent  and  may  be  molded  to  anything. 
Will  my  darling  husband  consider  them,  and  the  child  that  shall  be 
born  to  him  (if  it  live),  as  sacred  loans  from  the  hand  of  God,  to  be 
given  up  by  him  when  he  shall  call  them  hence,  and  an  account 
given  of  the  manner  in  which  their  tender,  innocent  minds  were 
guided  ? 

"  '  If,  my  beloved  William,  you  should  marry  again,  do  it  wisely, 
choosing  a  Christian  helpmeet,  and  one  that  may  have  sense  and 
discretion  enough  to  make  you  willing  to  intrust  the  whole  charge 
and  bringing  up  of  your  children  to  her,  should  accident  or  death 
take  you  from  them  ;  but  could  you  be  as  happy  alo7ie  with  your 
rapidly  growing  children,  I  should,  of  course,  prefer  that  you  did 
not  venture  your  happiness  and  theirs  in  so  perilous  a  lottery  ;  but 
take  God  more  closely  to  your  heart  than  ever,  as  a  never-failing 
friend  and  counselor,  who  has  promised  to  be  with  the  orphans  and 
bereaved  in  all  times  of  trial  and  difficulty.  To  you  I  would  say  : 
Desire  not  great  things  of  this  world  for  yourself  or  children,  but 
pray  earnestly  that  sound  minds  and  sound  bodies  may  be  given  to 
you,  and  the  true  medium  of  happiness,  without  danger,  that  is, 
"  neither  poverty  nor  riches."  Do  not  be  solely  or  too  much  en- 
grossed by  business  ;  take  a  moderate  part    in    politics  and  your 


268  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

country's  good.  Without  7noderation  you  may  tumble  headlong  in  a 
course  that  is  not  a  good  or  a  wise  one,  and  temperance  of  speech  and 
action  becomes  a  Christian  as  much  as  temperance  in  meats  or  drinks. 
Try  to  be  useful  in  the  religious  world  and  in  the  Church  to  which 
you  belong,  taking  the  Bible  for  your  guide.  If  I  die  at  this  time,  I 
would  say  that  your  best  plan  by  far  is  to  go  home  with  the  children 
and  get  your  own  friends  to  know  and  love  them.  I  would  not 
remain  in  the  Everton  house  ;  a  new  one  would  divert  your  mind 
and  theirs,  and  they  are  such  nervous,  superstitious  little  creatures 
that  visiting  my  old  haunts  again  may  excite  a  fear  and  terror  in 
their  minds  which  they  may  be  ashamed  to  acknowledge,  but  which 
may  greatly  augment  their  misery  at  returning  home  without  a 
mother's  love  and  company. 

"  '  If  God  should  see  fit  to  take  me  hence,  I  trust  that  both  you  and 
they  will  not  indulge  in  useless  grief,  but  at  once  turn  your  minds  to 
active  usefulness,  endeavoring  to  be  happy  by  doing  the  will  of  your 
Father  in  heaven,  and  looking  forward  with  hope  and  certainty  to 
that  blessed  reunion  where  sin  and  sorrow  are  no  more. 

"  'I  commit  myself,  soul  and  body,  into  the  hands  of  my  merciful 
Creator,  feeling  deeply  my  utter  helplessness  as  a  sinner  in  his  sight, 
but  trusting  to  that  blood  of  cleansing  which  taketh  away  all  sin — 
the  blessed  Lamb  of  God,  Jesus,  my  all-sufficient  Saviour.  Healotie 
is  my  hope.  I  trust  his  word  that  he  will  never  leave  me  nor  forsake 
me,  vile  and  polluted  as  I  am. 

"  '  Perhaps  Mr.  Mills  would  bury  dear  Caroline  beside  me  in  Green- 
wood Cemetery,  or,  if  his  ground  is  already  prepared,  let  me  lie 
pretty  near  her.' 

[Harriet  omitted  to  sign  the  above  beautiful  letter. — Wm.  W.] 

"  April  29,  1846.  Tom  Kane  left  this  morning  for  Philadelphia. 
He  is  a  kind-hearted,  clever  fellow. 

"  May  I,  1846.  I  received  yesterday  a  letter  from  my  sister  Eliza, 
dated  Naples,  March  3,  1846.  She  is  going  for  a  month  to  Rome, 
and  then  to  Graefenburg  in  Germany.  I  regret  to  see  no  mention 
of  God  or  heavenly  things  in  all  her  letters.  Oh  !  may  he  be  with 
her  and  James,  and  hedge  up  their  ways  so  that  they  may  be  turned 
into  the  narrow  path.  My  blessed  Harriet's  letters  are  a  great  con- 
solation to  me.     They  show  her  heavenly-mindedness  so  much,  and 


HARRIET'S   LAST  COUNSELS   TO   ME.  269 

breathe  so  much  of  that  '  good  hope  through  grace.'  By  the  bye,  I 
can't  find  that  expression  in  the  Bible  or  in  the  little  concordance 
which  I  have  by  me,  and  yet  I  think  it  or  its  equivalent  is  in 
the  Bible.* 

"  Monday,  May  4,  1846.  Three  weeks  to-day  since  my  blessed 
wife  was  in  all  her  beauty,  the  day  before  she  was  taken  ill.  I  have 
been  very  low  and  sad  to-day,  thinking  of  my  not  having  remained 
at  home  all  Wednesday,  April  15.  Powell  tells  me  that  Harriet  said 
several  times  that  day  she  wished  Mr.  Wood  were  at  home,  and  Mrs. 
Anthony,  the  nurse,  said  she  (Harriet)  first  complained  of  a  great 
feeling  of  cold  internally,  and  wanted  the  doctor,  as  she  felt  uneasy. 
Margaret  Hone,  who  was  in  the  parlor,  went  for  Dr.  Berger,  and  then 
Powell  immediately  after,  and  then  Dr.  Trudeau  came.  I  have 
already  mentioned  that  the  cold  feeling  was  succeeded  by  heat,  and 
then  cold  again.  God  have  mercy  on  me  !  The  recollection  of  all 
her  worth  and  loveliness,  and  her  sufferings,  and  my  great  loss, 
nearly  drive  me  distracted.  If  I  had  only  stayed  at  home  that 
Wednesday,  April  15,  from  the  office,  I  should  have  felt  better, 
although  I  know  it  ivas  to  be.  God's  will  be  done,  but  it  is  an  awful 
loss  !  Powell  says  that  once,  when  she  was  in  Harriet's  room  on 
April  15,  my  blessed  one  shook  her  head  very  mournfully  at  her. 
I  think  she  must  have  even  then  been  alarmed,  and,  as  she  knew  Dr. 
Burns'  book  well,  she  must  have  recollected  his  description  of  a 
'  weed,'  or  childbed  fever.  At  the  end  of  it  he  describes  just  her 
symptoms,  and  says  immediate  attention  is  necessary. 

"  Sent  a  Telegraph  newspaper,  with  her  obituary,  to  Archie  Mor- 
rison, Eaton  Hall,  near  Norwich,  per  Great  Western." 

*  2  Thess.  ii.  13. — Ed. 


CHAPTER    XVI. 

SPRING     AND     EARLY     SUMMER     OF      1846     IN     NEW     YORK    AND    NEW 

BRIGHTON,    S.    I. 

"  Tuesday,  May  5,  1846.  Called  on  Dr.  Hutton  to-day  and  reg- 
istered my  little  son's  birth  :  '  Alexander  Dennistoun  Wood,  born 
Tuesday,  April  14,  1846.'  The  registry  is  kept  in  the  Reformed 
Dutch  Church,  Washington  Square,  New  York,  and  is  a  legal  doc- 
ument. 

"  My  mind  much  easier  and  more  submissive  to  God's  will  to-day. 
Called  on  Maria  De  Peyster  and  had  much  pleasant  conversation 
with  her  about  my  blessed  Harriet ;  old  Mrs.  Bedell  there.  When 
I  came  home  to  the  New  York  Hotel,  I  found  Mr.  Mills,  and  after- 
ward came  Mr.  and  Mrs.  T.  C.  Winthrop  and  Frank. 

"Friday,  May  15,  1846.  I  wrote  by  the  steamer  to-day  to  Mary, 
Anna,  Aunt  Helen,  and  my  clerk,  Henry  Jones  ;  to  the  last  about 
Ann  Birch  and  Harriet's  other  two  pensioners,  Mrs.  Saltus  and 
'  Old  Maggie,'  and  desired  him  to  continue  their  pensions  till  I 
came  home.  Said  to  Anna  that  I  changed  my  mind  a  dozen 
times  a  day  about  staying  here  or  returning  to  Liverpool,  but 
thought  I  ought  to  consider  my  children  most,  and  J.  Walter  and 
Charlotte  were  very  averse  to  returning.  Sometimes  I  thought  I 
would  like  to  get  into  my  old  mill-horse  work  at  Liverpool  ; 
again  I  felt  as  if  it  would  make  me  go  crazy  to  be  there  with- 
out Harriet.  I  suppose  by  this  time  (Sunday,  May  17)  they  will 
know  in  Liverpool,  Glasgow,  and  London,  and  probably  in  Elie,  of 
my  irreparable  loss  ;  and  so  I  doubt  not  that  prayer  has  been  made 
for  me  and  mine,  and  may  God  hear  the  petitions  for  Christ's  sake. 
To-day  Harriet's  maternal  uncle,  Mr.  David  Codwise,  her  mother's 
youngest  brother,  called  on  me.  He  is  a  very  hale,  good-looking 
man,  upward  of  sixty,  and  married  to  Harriet's  cousin,  who  was  a 
Miss  Matilda  Livingston,  daughter  of  Captain  Gilbert  Livingston  of 
a  British   cavalry  regiment,  who   fought  on  the  royalist  side   at  the 

270 


SPRING  AND   EARLY   SUMMER   OF    1846.  2/1 

Revolution,  and  had  a  pension  of  one  hundred  pounds  per  annum 
till  his  death  ;  and  then  his  widow,  Harriet's  aunt,  got  fifty  pounds 
per  annum  from  the  British  Government  till  her  death.  She  only 
died  a  few  years  ago  ;  was  alive  when  I  was  married  on  September 
15,  1830,  and  lived  on  the  west  side  of  Greenwich  Street,  below 
Rector.  Mr.  Codwise  told  me  that  Harriet's  grandfather,  John 
Kane  of  Dutchess  County,  was  a  very  fine-looking,  large,  tall  man, 
and  a  first-rate  classical  scholar,  able  to  quote  Homer  and  Horace. 
Mr.  Codwise  saw  a  great  deal  of  the  old  gentleman  at  his  sister's 
(Harriet's  mother)  house  when  he  was  a  lad  at  college.  Mr.  David 
Codwise's  great-grandfather  spelled  his  name  '  Godwise.'  David 
Codwise,  when  a  lad,  used  to  walk  every  week  forty  miles  to  Stam- 
ford, Conn.,  where  his  father  had  a  country  house.  His  father  was 
a  shipmaster  and  owner  of  a  brig  called  the  Maria,  built  at  Staten 
Island  under  his  own  superintendence.  In  her  he  traded  between 
New  York  and  Santa  Cruz  on  his  own  account.  He  had  one  crew 
for  eight  years,  and  used  to  call  them  his  '  boys.'  When  not  at  sea, 
they  had  half  wages.  He  married  a  Miss  Van  Ranst,  whose  mother 
was  a  Beekman.  Harriet's  mother's  name  was  Maria.  There  is  a 
picture  of  her  and  of  my  blessed  wife  Harriet,  when  a  child  of  two 
or  three  years  old,  in  Charles  Winthrop's  (now  Robert  Winthrop's) 
possession.  David  Codwise  told  me  that  Harriet's  grandfather,  John 
Kane,  was  originally  a  tenant  of  the  Livingstons  in  Dutchess 
County,  where  he  kept  a  large  store,  and  it  was  there  that  Captain 
Gilbert  Livingston  saw  and  fell  in  love  with  Miss  Kane.  Mr.  Cod- 
wise says  her  father*  may  afterward  have  acquired  property  of  his 
own  in  that  county,  and  that  he  married  a  Miss  Kent,  an  aunt  of 
Chancellor  Kent. 

"  May  2  1,  1846.  Got  a  very  good  daguerreotype  taken  of  myself, 
and  two  taken  of  the  daguerreotype  of  my  blessed  Harriet  that  was 
done  in  London  in  August  or  September,  1841  ;  also  one  of  Rogers' 
miniature  of  her  taken  in  New  York  in  the  summer  of  1829,  when  she 

*  John  Kane  did  own  property  of  his  own.  It  was  confiscated  by  Act  of 
Attainder,  October  22,  1779.  He  subsequently  enjoyed  a  pension  from  the  British 
Government  in  consideration  of  his  losses,  and  commissions  in  the  British  Army 
were  offered  to  his  sons.  His  house  and  store  were  standing  when  Judge  John  K. 
Kane  was  a  young  man.  He  described  them  in  a  letter  to  his  father,  Elisha,  now 
in  my  possession. — E.  D.  Kane. 


272  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

was  nineteen,  and  one  of  the  miniature  taken  of  her  by  Hargreave 
in  Liverpool,  1833,  when  she  was  just  twenty-three. 

"  Saturday,  May  23,  1846.  Paid  Booth's  bill  to-day  for  three 
drives  with  my  beloved  Harriet  on  6th,  9th,  and  nth  of  April.  On 
the  last-named  date  Harriet  and  I  went  with  little  Harriet  after  din- 
ner round  Tompkins  Square,  Gramercy  Park,  and  then  down  Broad- 
way below  Niblo's.  Many  people  were  walking  up  and  down 
Broadway,  and  I  recollect  remarking  to  my  beloved  one,  that  there 
they  were  walking  as  we  walked  seventeen  years  ago,  and  they  would 
be  doing  so  seventeen  years  after  we  were  dead  and  buried.  Little 
did  I  then  think  it  would  be  the  last  drive  I  was  ever  to  have 
with  her.  She  was  looking  lovely  that  day.  I  believe  it  was  the 
very  day  (May  23,*  1829)  seventeen  years  ago  that  I  became  engaged 
to  Harriet  at  No.  40  Warren  Street,  front  room,  second  story,  used 
by  Mr.  John  Hone  as  a  library. 

"  Monday,  June  i,  1846.  Moved  to-day  from  the  New  York 
Hotel,  without  my  blessed  Harriet,  but  with  all  ow  dear  children. 
This  was  little  Alick's  first  excursion.  We  drove  down  Broadway 
to  the  New  Brighton  ferryboat  at  Pier  No.  i,  North  River.  First 
came  baggage  cart,  then  a  coach  with  Powell,  Mrs.  Anthony,  and 
little  Alick,  Bessie,  Harrie,  and  Helen,  and  in  another  Charlotte, 
J.  Walter,  Willie,  and  L  Maria  De  Peyster,  Harriet  and  Julia  Mills, 
Carrie  Neilson,  and  Margaret  Lawrence  came  to  see  us  off,  with 
little  Willie  Neilson.  The  day  has  turned  out  fine.  Our  rooms  here 
at  New  Brighton  (Miss  Morris')  seem  clean  and  comfortable.  I  have 
many  and  undeserved  mercies  and  blessings  still  about  me,  but  how 
my  blessed  Harriet  would  have  liked  this  place,  if  we  had  only 
been  here  instead  of  Glen  Cove  in  1844  !  However,  my  mind  was 
much  depressed  then,  and  /  might  not  have  liked  this  any  better 
than  Glen  Cove.  Oh,  let  me  learn  by  past  experience  to  cultivate 
a  cheerful  and  thankful  disposition,  and  enjoy  the  blessings  God 
gives  me  for  \.\it present. 

"  Tuesday,  June  2,  1846.  To-day  I  got  my  letters  per  Hibernia 
steamer  till  May  19,  from  Mary,  Anna,  Cross,  Eleanor,  John,  Fanny, 
Mrs.  Humphreys,  Mr.  Haywood,  and  Mr.  Kelly,  all  very  kind  and 
sympathizing.     It  did  me  good  to  see  how  much  my  blessed  Harriet 

*I  don't  see  how  I  could  make  the  mistake  of  taking  April  11  for  May  23,  as  I 
evidently  did  in  writing  the  foregoing. —Wm.  W.,  May  3,  1892. 


SPRING  AND   EARLY   SUMMER   OF    1 846.  273 

was  beloved  and  esteemed.  I  only  wish  she  had  been  here  to  see 
and  enjoy  the  letters.  Mary's,  Anna's,  and  Cross'  were  particularly 
kind,  and  also  the  Rev.  John  Kelly's  and  Mrs.  Humphreys'.  Anna 
and  Cross  want  me  to  come  home,  and  as  my  blessed  one  also  wanted 
me  to  go  there,  I  suppose,  if  we  all  be  spared,  I  must  go  next  year 
with  the  children. 

"  Wednesday,  June  3,  1846.  Went  to  Maria  De  Peyster's  with  the 
above-named  letters  ;  she  wept  over  them,  poor  thing.  I  left  Elea- 
nor's (Mrs.  Alexander  Dennistoun)  and  Mr.  Kelly's  with  her  to  read 
to  poor  Anna  Winthrop. 

"  I  see  that  my  poor  aunt  Ann  Wood,  my  father's  eldest  sister, 
died  at  Elie,  May  13,  1846,  and  would  be  the  first  of  the  family  to 
meet  Harriet  in  heaven.  She  was  told  of  Harriet's  death  the  day 
she  died. 

"Tuesday,  June  9,  1846.  Went  with  De  Peyster,  Foster,  and 
John  Hone  to  dine  at  Foster's  cottage  near  the  telegraph  station, 
Staten  Island.  My  little  Charlotte  was  there,  and  Maria,  Jane  Hone, 
Julia,  Sarah,  and  Harriet  Mills,  and  of  course  Emily  Foster.  These 
all  came  running  out  to  meet  me  as  we  arrived,  but  my  own  blessed 
one  was  not  there,  she  who  was  the  life  and  soul  of  all  these  family 
reunions,  who  always  looked  the  loveliest,  and  who  always  ran  to 
meet  me  with  her  kind  welcome.  Her  absence  went  to  my  heart 
like  a  knife,  and  made  me  miserable.  Poor  Maria  has  also  a  bad 
cough  and  looked  ill.     Charlotte  quite  enjoyed  herself,  so  much  is 

'     .    .    .    the  mind  its  own  place, 
And  of  itself  can  make  a  hell  of  heaven,  a  heaven  of  hell.' 

"  Dear,  dear  Harriet,  oh,  what  a  wife  she  was  !  what  a  sweet  guide 
and  counselor  !  The  very  ideal  of  a  perfect  Christian  wife  and 
mother,  and  so  lovely  in  face  and  person,  so  witty  withal.  I  walked 
home  by  myself  four  miles  and  found  the  communing  with  my  own 
thoughts  was  more  wholesome  than  being  in  society. 

"  I  took  no  wine,  and  by  God's  blessing  will  follow  my  blessed 
wife's  advice  to  be  temperate  and  moderate  in  all  things. 

"Wednesday,  June  10,  1846.  With  Mr.  De  Peyster  met  Maria  at 
the  Staten  Island  boat,  and  went  with  them  to  see  the  interior  of 
Trinity  Church. 

"  Following  is  a  sort  of  sketch  of  my  blessed  wife's  character  as 


274  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

given  in  the  Rev.  John  Kelly's  letter  to  me  of  May  i8,  1846,  after 
receipt  by  him  of  the  news  of  her  death:  'It  required  indeed  a 
very  slight  acquaintance  with  your  late  dear  wife  to  perceive  that 
she  was  distinguished  by  no  ordinary  excellence  pf  character.  Her 
intelligence,  her  sound  good  sense,  her  gentleness,  her  interest  in 
the  welfare  of  others,  her  admirable  management  of  her  own  family, 
her  sincere  but  unobtrusive  piety,  commanded  more  than  the  esteem 
of  all  who  had  the  pleasure  of  her  acquaintance,  and  were  capable 
of  appreciating  moral  excellency,  while  her  love  of  home,  by  con- 
centrating these  qualities  in  one  place,  heightened  their  influence 
there,  and  made  her  the  light  and  joy  of  that  domestic  circle  which 
she  so  richly  adorned.'  How  true  and  just.  God  bless  him  for 
appreciating  my  darling  as  he  did. 

"  Saw  Captain  Finch,  now  Captain  Bolton,  U.  S.  N.,  in  the  boat 
to-day  ;  he  did  not  know  me.  I  saw  him  last  when  he  dined  with  us 
in  Liverpool  in  1832,  when  John  Walter  was  nine  months  old.  The 
captain  was  an  old  beau  of  Harriet's. 

*'  Saturday,  June  13.  There  came  to-day  to  our  office  in  Wall 
Street  a  Mr.  Isaac  Pierson,  who  asked  for  me,  saying  that  Mrs,  Pier- 
son,  my  aunt,  was  at  the  Western  Hotel.  I  went  there  and  saw  her  ; 
she  is  about  seventy-four,  yellow  and  wrinkled,  but  still  with  some 
trace  of  what  she  was  when  I  knew  her  as  Aunt  Mary  Wood.  She 
it  was  who,  under  God,  converted  her  cousin,  Dr.  Thomas  Chalmers, 
then  minister  of  Kilmany,  from  a  mere  Deist  to  be  the  great  Christian 
minister  which  he  became.  Now  she  looks  like  Meg  Merrilies  in  a 
consumption  ;  tall,  gaunt,  and,  in  fact,  a  specimen  of  the  genus 
'  hag.'  However,  there  she  was,  my  father's  sister,  whom  I  had  not 
seen  for  twenty-four  years.  The  last  time  she  had  seen  me  I  was  in 
the  Greek  class  at  the  University  of  Glasgow.  It  was  most  painful 
to  me  to  think  that  here  was  a  person  so  nearly  related  to  me,  who 
had  never  known  me  during  all  that  part  of  my  life  that  was  worth 
living  for,  who  had  never  seen  my  darling  Harriet.  After  telling  her 
stepson,  the  Mr.  Isaac  Pierson  aforesaid,  that  he  ought  to  take  her 
in  an  omnibus  up  to  Union  Square,  I  repented,  and  took  a  coach 
to  her  hotel,  and  drove  with  her  up  to  Union  Square,  Gramercy 
Park,  etc.  The  last  time  I  was  riding  there  was  with  my  blessed 
Harriet !  What  a  contrast  !  I  felt  angry  with  myself  for  not 
feeling    more    kindly  to    Aunt    Mary.      Her    clothes    were    good 


SPRING  AND   EARLY   SUMMER   OF    1 846.  2/5 

enough,  but  pitchforked  on  her,  and  her  hair  was  far  from  being 
nicely  dressed. 

"  June  22.  I  saw  her  off  on  board  the  packet  ship  Rochester,  bound 
for  Liverpool.  I  was  more  reconciled  to  her  appearance  to-day. 
She  has  got  a  good  stateroom  and  I  gave  the  stewardess  five  dollars 
to  take  care  of  her.  I  also  gave  her  my  plaid  to  keep  her  warm, 
which  I  intended  as  an  offset  in  my  mind  for  the  want  of  affectionate 
feeling  to  her.  The  wind  is  west,  and  I  dare  say  she  will  have  a  fine 
passage.  I  did  not  take  her  down  to  Staten  Island  to  see  the  chil- 
dren, as,  if  /  felt  as  I  did  to  her,  when  in  my  youth  I  had  known 
her  as  a  ladylike  person,  and  they  had  no  such  recollection,  their 
seeing  her  would  have  left  on  their  young  minds  a  painful  and  dis- 
agreeable impression  of  their  grandaunt. 

"  Saturday,  July  4,  1846.  A  '  raw  and  gusty  day,'  at  least,  rainy 
and  foggy,  and  very  cool  for  the  season  ;  the  whole  past  month  of 
June  has  been  remarkably  cold  and  wet  for  this  climate.  My  dear 
Charlotte  went  up  to  visit  the  Winthrops  at  Dosoris,  Long  Island, 
on  Thursday,  2d  inst.,  with  Mr.  De  Peyster  and  her  aunt  Maria ; 
the  latter  was  looking  and  feeling  ill,  with  great  pain  in  her  chest, 
and  also  much  distressed  about  her  sister  Cornelia's  approaching 
death,  leaving  her  two  orphan  children,  Mary  and  John  Smyth,  quite 
unprovided  for.  The  latter  is  to  be  taken  care  of  by  his  father's 
relatives.*  The  former  (Mary)  ought  to  be  taken  care  of  by  her 
half  sister,  Cornelia  Forsyth,  but  Mr.  Forsyth  objects ;  he  must  be 
a  poor,  miserable,  contemptible,  small-souled  creature,  as  he  is  well 
off,  and  has  only  two  children.  I  believe  Mary  Smyth  is  a  fine,  intel- 
ligent girl  of  about  fifteen,  and,  I  understand,  a  child  of  God.  If  it 
were  not  for  the  state  of  my  finances,  and  that  my  uncles  might  men- 
tally object  to  my  so  increasing  my  already  large  family,  I  would  like 
much  to  take  and  bring  up  Mary  Smyth.  She  would  be  a  fine  com- 
panion for  Charlotte,  and  my  blessed  Harriet  thought  a  great  deal 
of  her.  Perhaps  when  I  go  home  I  may  see  a  way  to  do  this.  She 
has  two   claims,  as  one    of  God's   dear  children  and    as    Harriet's 

*  Which  he  wasn't,  but  by  his  aunt,  Maria  De  Peyster.  He  subsequently  became 
a  clerk  in  Dennistoun.Wood  &  Co.'s  office,  went  to  Melbourne,  Australia,  and  died 
in  1 891,  Vice  Consul  General  for  the  United  Stales  there.  Mary  was  a  lovely,  good 
girl,  married  a  Mr.  Rathbun  of  Albany,  was  thrown  from  her  carriage  there  and 
killed  on  the  spot  some  years  ago.     (I  write  this  March  8,  1892.) 


276  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

niece.  I  recollect  she  and  I  spoke  about  it  before  she  was  taken  ill, 
and  she  would  have  liked  to  do  it  if  we  could  afford  it. 

"  This  day  (July  4)  last  year  we  went  in  two  carriages  to  Oyster 
Bay.  Charles  Winthrop  and  I  were  in  one,  and  Harriet,  Maria,  and 
Mr.  De  Peyster  in  the  other.  We  bathed,  pulled  cherries,  etc. 
Afterward  there  was  a  ball  in  the  evening  at  Glen  Cove.  I  recollect 
that  I  did  not  much  enjoy  the  day.  O  God,  how  I  have  despised 
and  neglected  thy  great  mercies  !  to  think  of  my  not  rapturously 
enjoying  any  party  in  which  my  blessed  Harriet  was.  Yet  I  fancy 
it  was  because   I  could  not  get  enough  of  her  society  to  myself. 

"Thursday,  July  9,  1846.  Went  to  Greenwood  Cemetery  with 
Mr.  De  Peyster  to  see  the  monument  erected  to  my  darling  Harriet. 
It  is  of  grayish  red  sandstone,  the  same  as  Trinity  Church  is  built 
of  ;  it  is  a  plain  column,  standing  on  a  cubical  base,  and  on  the  top 
of  the  column  a  lachrymatory  urn  with  a  wreath  round  it.  The 
monument  looks  elegant  and  modest,  like  her  dear,  sweet  self, 
and  I  think  she  would  have  been  pleased  with  it.  I  thanked 
God  that  he  had  enabled  me  to  afford  to  put  up  this  small  token  of 
respect  to  her  blessed  memory. 

"  The  inscription  is  as  follows  : 

IN   MEMORY    OF 

HARRIET  AMELIA, 

DAUGHTER  OF  THE  LATE  JOHN  KANE  OF  NEW  YORK 
AND  WIFE  OF 

WILLIAM   WOOD  OF  LIVERPOOL. 

Born  in  New  York  April  12,  1810, 

Married  September  15,  1830, 

And  after  an  absence  of  fourteen  years  in  Great  Britain,  while  on  a  visit  to 

her  native  country, 

Died  in  New  York 

April  17,  1846, 

In  full  assurance  of  eternal  happiness  through  the  atoning  blood  of  her  Redeemer. 

'  Encompassed  in  an  angel's  form 
An  angel's  spirit  lay.' 

"  The  plot  of  ground  is  surrounded  by  a  neat  iron  railing  with 
every  now  and  then  an  iron   torch   inverted  as   a   supporter.     It  is 


SPRING  AND   EARLY   SUMMER   OF    1 846.  2/7 

overhung  by  four  trees,  and  is  on  a  slope  facing  the  southeast  and 
overlooking  a  fiat  plain  and  the  ocean  beyond  it.  It  is  a  beautiful 
spot,  cheerful  and  pleasant.  I  hope  against  hope  that  I  may  some 
day  lie  beside  her  there  on  the  right  side  of  the  monument  ;  she  lies 
on  the  left.  If  I  do  not  lie  there,  yet,  thank  God,  through  that 
precious  blood  of  Christ,  we  shall  meet  at  the  right  hand  of  God  to 
rejoice  together  in  his  glorious  presence.  Oh  !  God  be  with  me  and 
mine  even  unto  the  end.  I  sometimes  realize  in  a  faint  degree  the 
joy  we  shall  feel  in  meeting  at  our  Father's  throne. 

"  '  My  first,  last  love  ;  the  idol  of  my  youth, 
The  darling  of  my  manhood,  and  alas  ! 
Now  the  most  blessed  memory  of  mine  age.' 

"Monday,  July  13,  1846.  Took  John  Walter,  Charlotte,  Bessie, 
Harriet,  Willie,  Helen,  and  Powell,  'the  nurse,'  to  Greenwood  Ceme- 
tery, going  from  this  (Staten  Island)  in  the  8  a.  m.  boat  to  New  York, 
and  thence  to  Brooklyn,  where  I  got  a  coach  and  a  cab.  They  were 
all  very  much  pleased  with  the  monument.  Dear  little  Harriet  read 
the  inscription  aloud.  I  thought  I  saw  the  tears  in  J.  W.'s,  Char- 
lotte's, and  Powell's  eyes.  My  ground  is  really  a  sweet  spot,  and  I 
think  the  monument  the  most  elegant  and  classical  in  Greenwood. 
We  returned  by  the  noon  boat,  and  then  I  began  to  pack  for  my 
European  voyage.  The  day  was  very  fine.  I  dined  with  the  chil- 
dren at  Miss  Morris',  and  intend  to  leave  to-morrow  for  Boston,  to 
sail  thence  for  Liverpool  per  Britannia  steamer,  the  first  built  of  the 
Cunard  line  and  only  eight  hundred  tons  burden.  May  God  in  his 
mercy  watch  over  my  dear  children  and  myself,  and  spare  us  to 
*  bear  one  another's  burdens.'  I  have  copied  out  that  part  of  my 
darling  Harriet's  will  relating  to  John  Walter,  and  on  another  paper 
those  facts  relating  to  the  other  children,  leaving  the  former  with 
John  Walter  and  the  latter  with  Charlotte,  and  on  July  11  I  wrote  a 
sort  of  letter  of  advice,  in  case  of  my  death,  addressed  to  all  my 
children.  The  original  I  leave  with  Charlotte  and  a  press  copy  with 
John  Walter. 

"July  14,  1846.  I  left  New  York  en  route  for  Boston  by  the  Oregon 
steamer,  and  had  a  beautiful  sail  up  the  Sound,  but  I  felt  very 
melancholy  and  depressed  when  we  passed  Glen  Cove  and  the  locust 


2/8  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

grove  on  the  bluff  near  Mrs.  Clement's  where  Harriet  and  I  had  so 
often  sat  together  in  the  summers  of  1844  and  1845. 

"  July  15,  1846.  Arrived  at  Boston  at  6  A.  M.,  and  put  up  at  the 
Albion  Hotel.  Ascended  the  Bunker  Hill  Monument  with  Tom 
Sellar.  There  is  a  fine  view  from  it,  but  not  so  good  as  from  the 
State  House.  Wrote  part  of  a  letter  to  John  Walter  in  the  evening. 
I  am  much  disappointed  with  the  size  of  our  stateroom  in  the 
Britannia." 


CHAPTER  XVII. 

SUMMER    OF    1846 — I     RETURN     ALONE     TO     ENGLAND,    AND     IN    THE 
AUTUMN  COME  BACK  TO  MAKE  MY  HOME  IN  NEW  YORK. 

"  I  SAILED  per  steamer  Britannia  for  Halifax  and  Liverpool,  July 
16,  1846.  There  were  many  ministers  on  board,  going  to  attend 
the  first  meeting  of  the  Evangelical  Alliance  in  London.  Some 
time  on  the  i8th  we  struck  upon  the  Jiddaw  ledges,  and  there 
we  were  hard  and  fast,  with  a  slight  swell  and  the  steamer  rolling 
and  grating  on  the  rocks.  The  boats  were  all  got  ready  for  launch- 
ing, and  cork  jackets  were  distributed  all  about  to  the  passengers, 
many  of  the  ministers  putting  them  on.  I  and  Sellar  and  several 
Southern  men,  about  sixteen  in  all,  had  got  the  steward  to  give  us 
downstairs  a  large  room  where  we  took  our  meals.  That  day  all 
Avere  so  anxious  about  our  probable  shipwreck  that  no  one  went 
down  to  dinner  but  myself  and  Joshua  Dixon  of  New  Orleans,  nick- 
named *  The  Parson,'  from  his  sober,  quiet  manners.  While  sitting 
at  dinner  we  could  feel  and  hear  the  ship  grating  upon  the  rocks. 
When  we  had  finished  the  first  courses,  Dixon  was  for  going  on  deck 
without  the  dessert.  I  said  :  '  No,  let  us  go  calmly  through  the 
whole  thing,'  which  we  did,  and  then  went  on  deck,  where  the  pas- 
sengers were  walking  up  and  down,  very  anxious.  The  engineer  had 
advised  the  captain  to  let  him  empty  one  of  the  boilers,  which  was 
done,  and  the  steamer  floated  and  backed  off  the  rock  on  which  we 
had  first  struck,  only  to  strike  and  stick  upon  another.  I  went  down 
to  my  stateroom,  put  all  the  gold  I  had  into  my  pockets,  wrote  on 
my  card  where  to  send  my  body  if  we  were  all  drowned,  and  put  it 
in  my  pocketbook,  and  then  was  ready  for  the  worst.  After  several 
maneuvers  we  did  get  off  all  the  rocks,  with  a  hole  in  the  fore  part 
of  the  steamer,  and  making  a  good  deal  of  water.  Finally  we 
reached  Halifax,  where  a  survey  was  held  on  the  Britajinia,  and 
a  bulkhead  built  across  the  fore  part  of  the  steamer  and  the 
hole  plugged  up  in  some  way.  After  a  day's  detention  we  resumed 
our   voyage.      I    had    written    to    Charlotte    from    Halifax,    telling 

279 


28o  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

her  of  our  danger  and  inclosing  the  card  on  which  I  had  written 
about  my  body.  Unfortunately  on  opening  my  letter  the  card 
dropped  out  of  it,  and  she  read  the  card  first,  which  nearly  fright- 
ened her  out  of  her  wits,  poor  little  thing.  After  leaving  Halifax, 
with  all  our  repairs,  we  still  made  a  quantity  of  water,  and  our 
pumps  were  kept  going  all  the  time.  When  off  Newfoundland,  the 
pumps  got  choked  by  some  small  coal,  and  the  captain  thought  it 
might  be  necessary  to  put  into  port  there  again.  However,  the  coals 
were  cleared  away,  the  pumps  acted  well  again,  the  weather  was 
fine,  and  we  crossed  the  Atlantic  with  the  pumps  going  the  whole 
time.  We  arrived  off  Tuskar  at  lo  p.  m.  on  July  30,  and  on  Friday, 
July  31,  arrived  at  the  Coburg  Dock,  Liverpool,  where  the  dock 
authorities  allowed  the  Britannia  to  keep  her  furnaces  burning  that 
the  pumps  might  work  and  keep  her  free  of  water  until  the  cargo 
was  landed  and  she  could  be  placed  on  the  gridiron  and  the  hole  in 
her  forefoot  properly  repaired.  I  saw  her  there,  and  the  hole  looked 
upward  of  a  foot  square,  and  there  were  probably  other  holes  in  her 
bottom.  I  suppose  if  the  weather  had  been  boisterous  we  should  all 
have  gone  to  the  bottom. 

"  Sunday,  August  2,  1846.  I  went  to  the  Everton  Crescent  Inde- 
pendent Chapel  (Rev.  John  Kelly's)  and  partook  of  the  Lord's  Sup- 
per, and  was  much  comforted  and  edified.  Between  the  morning 
and  afternoon  services  I  went  to  my  own  house.  No.  i  Netherfield 
Road  South,  Everton,  and  was  soothed  by  being  where  my  blessed 
Harriet  and  I  had  been  so  much  together,  although  the  contrast 
between  my  leaving  on  July  6,  1844,  and  my  returning  on  August  2, 
1846,  was  very  sad.  I  had  a  key  of  the  playroom  on  the  third  story, 
which  had  been  locked  up  since  1844,  when  we  left  ;  the  Crosses 
had  possession  during  our  absence.  The  room  floor  had  nearly  half 
an  inch  of  dust  on  it,  and  there  was  a  platform  with  various  arrange- 
ments, made  for  the  children's  last  Christmas  festivities  by  Harriet. 
The  sight  made  me  inexpressibly  sad,  and  I  thought  that  I  could 
not  possibly  return  to  my  Everton  house  without  her.  This  was  on 
Sunday,  August  2. 

"  By  the  way,  Anna  and  Eliza,  who  had  written,  blaming  me 
for  the  feeling  I  had  toward  Aunt  Mary  Pierson  when  she  dropped 
down  upon  me  in  New  York  from  Missouri,  told  me  that  when 
she    got    to    Liverpool    per   Rochester   they    were    staying    at    New 


SUMMER   OF    1846 — I    RETURN   ALONE   TO   ENGLAND.     28 1 

Brighton,  and  went  down  to  receive  her  at  the  pier  there,  and  take 
her  up  to  the  hotel  they  were  staying  at.  When  they  saw  her,  they  did 
not  wonder  at  my  feelings  at  her  queer  appearance,  and  they  walked 
one  on  each  side  of  her  with  their  parasols  so  held  before  her  as  to 
prevent  her  being  seen  on  their  way  to  the  hotel,  where  they  could 
overhaul  her  backwoods  dress. 

"  Monday,  August  3,  1846.  I  had  a  long  conversation  with  my 
sister  Eliza,  and  although  much  depressed  since  my  return  to  Liver- 
pool by  the  contrast  between  the  past  and  the  present,  I  had  made 
up  my  mind  to  remain  in  Liverpool,  especially  as  Harriet  wished  it. 
I  have  prayed  fervently  that  God  will  direct  me  what  to  do,  and 
in  such  a  way  that  there  may  be  no  mistake  about  it. 

"August  4,  1846.  To-day  John  Dennistoun  reached  Liverpool 
from  London,  and  he.  Uncle  Alick,  Cross,  and  I  had  a  preliminary 
meeting  to  talk  over  matters  as  to  the  future  carrying  on  of  the 
business.  I  went  to  the  meeting  fully  intending  to  remain  in  Liver- 
pool. John  D.  asked  me  what  my  feelings  were  on  the  subject, 
which  I  stated,  but  said  I  wished  him  and  my  uncle  Alick  to  decide 
upon  what  they  considered  best  for  the  business  without  reference  to 
my  feelings.  Uncle  Alick  said  that  he  thought  I  had  better  return  to 
New  York,  and  it  was  at  once  decided  that  the  New  York  firm 
name  should  be  changed  from  Dennistoun  &  Co.  to  Dennistoun, 
Wood  &  Co.  I  am  to  continue  to  have  the  share  I  have  in  the 
general  business  and  ;!^iooo  salary  per  annum  in  addition,  T.  Sellar 
to  remain  in  Liverpool  with  John  Yuille.  My  uncle  Alick's  decision 
has  probably  fixed  my  fate  and  that  of  my  dear  children  for  life,  and 
though  contrary  to  my  blessed  Harriet's  wish,  and  my  own»idea  of 
duty  in  view  of  her  wishes,  I  have  no  doubt  that  the  decision  is 
right,  as  I  have  so  often  prayed  that  God  would  decide  for  me  in 
such  a  way  as  might  be  most  conducive  to  my  spiritual  welfare,  and 
also  in  such  a  way  as  might  leave  me  in  no  doubt  about  the  matter, 
and  he  seems  to  have  done  so. 

"  I  have  spoken  to  Cross  to-day  about  shutting  the  New  Orleans 
office  on  Sundays,  but  not  yet  to  the  others.  I  took  wine  to-day  for 
the  first  time  since  Harriet's  funeral,  April  19. 

"  My  uncle  Alick  drove  me  out  in  the  neighborhood  of  Liverpool, 
to  tell  me  that  he  had  bought  up,  with  John,  the  Hopes'  shares  in 
the  Borough  Bank  of  Liverpool,  and  that  they  were  going  to  appoint 


282  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Wm.  Cross  manager  with  a  salary  of  ^2500  per  annum.  I  said  I 
was  very  sorry  to  hear  about  the  purchase  of  the  Borough  Bank 
shares,  and  of  Cross  leaving  our  business.  I  told  Uncle  Alick  that 
I  feared,  in  case  of  any  financial  crisis,  we  would  fall  between  two 
stools.  Heretofore  we  could  always  count  upon  help  from  the  Glas- 
gow Bank  if  we  needed  it,  although  they  charged  a  good  price  for 
their  assistance,  selling  out  Consols  if  necessary  to  give  us  money, 
and  when  we  repaid  the  loan,  with  interest,  buying  back  Consols  if 
they  were  lower  then  when  they  sold  them,  and  pocketing  the  differ- 
ence ;  but  if  they  had  to  buy  in  Consols  at  a  higher  rate,  they  charged 
us  with  the  difference.  Now,  I  said,  the  Glasgow  Bank,  in  case  of  a 
crisis,  will  tell  us  to  apply  to  the  Borough,  and  the  Borough  will  prob- 
ably send  us  back  to  the  Glasgow. 

"  Cross  was  in  high  feather  about  his  appointment  as  manager  of 
the  Borough  Bank,  and  wanted  me,  as  his  wife's  trustee,  to  invest  her 
money  in  its  shares,  as  he  was  certain  they  would  rise  in  value  under 
his  management.  This  I  decidedly  refused  to  do,  as  I  thought  it 
highly  inexpedient  to  invest  trust  money  in  banking  business.  Cross 
was  ruffled  at  this,  and  asked  me  if  I  did  not  think  him  capable  of 
managing  a  bank  ;  I  said  I  would  show  him  that  I  did  think  him 
capable  of  doing  so  by  buying  myself  1000  shares  of  the  Borough 
Bank  at  their  par  value  of  ^10  per  share,  which  I  did  ;  my  objection 
was  only  to  putting  trust  money  into  any  investment  where  there 
was  a  banking  risk. 

"  I  spoke  to  Uncle  Alick  about  the  large  salary  Cross  had  as  man- 
ager of  the  Borough  Bank,  and  he  said  if  I  chose  to  give  up  my  share 
of  our  business  and  take  a  salary  of  ^^2500  per  annum  he  was 
willing  to  make  the  arrangement.  I  replied  that  I  would X.3.Ve.  the  salary 
and  give  up  my  share  of  the  business  ;  but  John  Dennistoun  de- 
murred to  any  such  arrangement,  and  Cross  said  I  would  be  a  great 
fool  if  I  made  it — that  he  believed  with  my  salary  and  share  I  would 
make  much  more  than  ^2500  per  annum.  He  believed  that  our 
business  profits  would  be  ^^20,000  per  annum,  and,  if  so,  my 
share  would  be  one-eighth,  equal  ^2500,  and  salary  ^^looo,  equal 
^^3500  per  annum.  Qn  the  other  hand,  I  say  we  will  not  make 
above  ^^10,000  per  annum,  my  share  of  which  would  be  _;^i25o,  and 
salary  ;^iooo,  equal  ^2550.  How  true  my  blessed  one's  saying 
was  that  we  should  always  be  taken  care  of,  and  how  true  to  me 


SUMMER   OF    1846 — I    RETURN   ALONE   TO   ENGLAND.     283 

the  20th  and  21st  verses  of  the  71st  Psahn,  which  she  has  marked  in 
her  Bible:  '  Thou,  that  has  showed  me  great  and  sore  troubles,  shalt 
quicken  me  again,  and  shalt  bring  me  up  again  from  the  depths  of 
the  earth.  Thou  shalt  increase  my  greatness  and  comfort  me  on 
every  side.'  " 

In  my  diary  about  August  4-10  there  are  various  entries  about 
cotton  and  flour,  and  future  business  arrangements,  and  this  curious 
memorandum  :  to  *  talk  with  Tom  Sellar  as  to  the  brusquerie  of  his 
manners.'  My  recollection  of  him  for  the  many  years  I  knew  him 
was  that  his  manners  were  pleasant  and  agreeable,  and  my  speaking 
to  him   about  *  brusquerie  '  was  akin   to  'Satan   reproving   sin.' 

On  August  10,  1846,  I  went  to  London  ;  a  visit  to  my  uncle  John 
Dennistoun  and  Fanny,  his  wife,  at  their  then  residence  in  one  of  the 
three  Grosvenor  Place  houses  overlooking  Queen's  Garden  across 
Grosvenor  Place.  His  lease  is  only  for  85  years,  and  for  the  lease  he 
paid  ;^85oo,  besides  ^100  per  month  rent.  The  furniture  and  paint- 
ing cost  him  ;^8ooo,  of  which  the  painting  of  the  drawing  room  was 
^,£"750,  and  of  the  roof  ^j^soo.  He  could  sell  in  the  season  the  house 
with  the  furniture  as  it  stands  for  ^20,000,  or  rent  it  for  ^1200  per 
annum.  The  drawing  room  is  in  the  shape  of  a  trapezium,  the  longer 
leg  which  goes  across  the  house  55x22,  and  the  other  fronting  on 
Grosvenor  Place  35x25. 

"  On  August  II,  1846  (Tuesday),  went  with  John  D.  to  the  House 
of  Lords,  and  heard  a  most  interesting  debate  on  what  was  called  the 
'  Hounslow  flogging  case.'  A  private,  White,  had  been  literally 
flogged  to  death,  at  least  he  died  from  the  flogging.  The  Lords  of 
Whig  politics  sat  on  one  side  of  the  House,  and  the  Tories  opposite 
them.  The  Duke  of  Wellington  sat  on  a  bench  of  which  there  were 
several  running  across  from  the  Whigs  to  the  Tories,  hence  the 
papers  spoke  of  '  the  noble  duke  on  the  cross  benches.'  He  rose, 
holding  himself  very  erect,  with  a  fine  military  bearing,  spoke  dis- 
tinctly, but  with  somewhat  of  the  mumbling  of  old  age,  was  apologetic 
about  the  Hounslow  case,  hoped  that  in  time  they  would  be  able  to 
maintain  discipline  in  the  army  without  flogging,  etc.,  etc.  The 
others  who  took  part  in  the  debate  were  Lord  Monteagle,  formerly 
Spring  Rice,  Lord  Fortescue,  I^ord  Brougham,  in  black  frock  coat 
and  checked  black  and  white  trousers — the  cuts  in  Pimch  represent 
him  exactly  ;  he  was  very  restless  when  sitting  down  and  continu- 


284  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

ally  scratching  the  back  of  his  head.  The  Duke  of  Buckingham  also 
spoke,  and  the  Duke  of  Grafton,  the  descendant  of  Charles  II.  and 
Nell  Gwynn.  The  Earl  of  Stanhope,  dressed  all  in  brown  with  a  brown 
wig,  also  spoke  ;  he  was  in  Paris  at  the  time  of  the  first  revolution, 
adopted  revolutionary  principles,  and  called  himself  'Citizen  Stan- 
hope.' Saw  also  Earl  St.  Germains,  late  Lord  Eliot  ;  also  Bishop 
Stanley,  who  belongs  to  the  eldest  branch  of  the  noble  family  of 
Stanley,  the  Stanleys  of  Alderley  in  Norfolk.  Bishop  Wilberforce  of 
Oxford,  in  his  gown  and  lawn  sleeves,  also  took  part  in  the  debate  ;  he 
is  the  son  of  William  Wilberforce,  and  is  nicknamed  '  Soapy  Samuel.' 
"  I  saw  several  messages  delivered  to  the  Lords  by  a  deputation 
from  the  House  of  Commons,  headed  by  the  Hon.  Grantley 
Berkeley,  a  very  dandified  gentleman,  with  ruffles,  and  his  wrist- 
bands turned  over  his  coat  sleeves.  The  Usher  of  the  Black  Rod, 
in  a  black  velvet  court  dress  and  court  sword  by  his  side,  when  the 
deputation  entered,  called  out  :  '  My  Lords,  a  message  from  the 
Commons  !  '  Whereupon  the  Lord  Chancellor,  Lord  Cottenham, 
formerly  Sir  Lucas  Pepys  (and  of  the  same  family  as  Pepys,  secre- 
tary to  the  Admiralty  in  James  II.'s  time,  and  writer  of  the  Diary), 
rose  from  the  woolsack,  a  large  crimson-colored  sofa,  shaped  like  a 
woolsack,  with  ears  at  the  four  corners,  and  marched  down,  with 
the  purse  in  his  hand,  to  the  bar.  He  (the  Chancellor)  was  a  comi- 
cal-looking figure  with  his  scarlet  robe  and  ermine  trimmings,  and 
his  great  curled  wig.  He  had  to  hold  up  his  robe,  or  gown,  as  he 
walked  to  the  bar,  and  looked  like  a  crazy  old  woman.  The  '  purse  ' 
was  like  a  small  carpetbag  with  the  arms  of  England  embroidered 
on  it  in  gold  and  silver.  This  he  laid  upon  the  bar,  and  Mr.  Grantley 
Berkeley  laid  upon  it — not  in  it — one  of  the  bills  from  the  Commons. 
Then  the  Chancellor  turned,  walked  back  to  the  woolsack,  sat 
down,  and  no  sooner  there  than  the  Usher  of  the  Black  Rod  called 
out  :  '  My  Lords  will  return  an  answer  by  messengers  of  their 
own  ! '  This  might  happen  fifty  or  sixty  times  a  day,  if  there  were 
as  many  bills.  To-day  I  think  there  were  twenty.  When  they 
were  all  presented,  the  Lord  Chancellor  put  on  his  three-cornered 
cocked  hat,  and,  sitting  down,  said  to  the  Commons  at  the  bar  :  '  My 
Lords  will  consider  and  send  messengers  of  their  own.'  My  Lords 
kept  the  deputation  from  the  Commons  waiting  and  standing  on  their 
feet  for  half  an  hour. 


SUMMER   OF    1846 — I    RETURN   ALONE   TO    ENGLAND.     285 

"August  12,  1846.  Two  years  to-day  since  I  landed  in  New 
York  with  my  wife  and  children.  I  went  with  John  D.  to-day  to 
Richmond  to  see  his  little  son  James,  and  spent  an  hour  at  the 
Castle  Inn  there.  A  beautiful  day.  Returning,  saw  the  Duchess  of 
Gloucester  and  Lady  Clementina  Villiers  on  their  way  to  some  din- 
ner party.  We  also  saw  Lord  Campbell  (Plain  John)  and  his 
daughters  in  the  park,  to  whom  John  bowed.  After  our  return 
from  Richmond  there  was  a  large  party  at  John's  house,  and  we  did 
not  sit  down  to  dinner  till  8.15  p.  m.  One  of  the  party,  to  whom 
John  introduced  me,  was  a  German  baron,  a  colonel  in  one  of  our 
cavalry  regiments.  He  had  a  fine  military  carriage,  as  erect  as  pos- 
sible, but  his  face  was  seamed  with  the  wrinkles  of  old  age,  for  he 
was  eighty,  which  I  thought  a  wonderful  age." 

From  London  I  returned  to  Liverpool  to  attend  to  various  busi- 
ness arrangements,  which  having  completed,  Will  Cross,  Mylne,  and 
I  started  off  for  a  jaunt  to  the  Highlands,  etc. 

I  received  on  my  arrival  from  London,  on  August  13,  a  letter 
from  Maria  De  Peyster,  dated  July  28,  telling  me  that  my  poor 
little  Alick  was  taken  ill  with  cholera  only  three  days  after  I  left,  on 
July  17,  and  died  July  25,  and  was  buried  July  27  beside  his 
blessed  mother. 

"August  20,  1846.  Left  Liverpool  for  a  jaunt  to  the  north  of 
England  and  Scotland,  accompanied  by  Will  Cross  and  W.  C.  Mylne. 
On  our  journey  north  we  noticed  field  after  field  as  black  as  coal 
from  the  effects  of  the  potato  disease.  We  reached  York  that  night 
and  slept  at  the  George  Hotel.  It  and  the  Black  Swan  are  the  two 
best  hotels  in  that  ancient  city.  Next  day  went  through  York  Min- 
ster, in  the  afternoon  proceeding  to  Newcastle-upon-Tyne,  and 
slept  at  the  Queen's  Head.  Saw  the  old  Norman  castle,  originally 
the  new  castle  ;  one  room  forty  feet  high.  In  the  town  there  are 
many  so-called  '  chares,'  or  narrow  lanes,  like  those  in  Genoa  or 
Trieste. 

"On  August  22,  1846,  by  coach  to  Berwick,  passing  Alnwick 
Castle,  the  seat  of  the  Percys.  From  Berwick  to  Edinburgh  by  the 
North  British  Railway,  along  the  coast  and  behind  North  Berwick 
Law  and  the  Bass  Rock,  opposite  Elie.  I  had  all  my  life  seen  these 
beautiful  objects  on  their  northern  side,  looking  from  Elie.  In  pass- 
ing through  East   Lothian,    or  Haddingtonshire,  noticed    that    the 


286  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

farming  was  splendid,  but  the  potato  and  bean  crops  were  destroyed 
by  the  prevailing  disease. 

"August  23,  1846.  Heard  in  Edinburgh  my  old  fellow-collegian 
at  the  University  of  Glasgow,  Dr.  Candlish,  preach  a  clever  sermon, 
marred,  however,  by  his  voice  and  delivery.  Cross  went  with  me  to 
church.  In  the  afternoon  called  on  Mrs.  Patrick  Wood,  the  second 
wife  and  widow  of  my  uncle,  the  captain,  whose  grave  I  visited  in 
the  Dean  Cemetery.  Spoke  of  bringing  out  to  my  office  in  New 
York  young  Walter  Wood,  the  captain's  son,  whom  I  christened 
*  Walter  the  Savage  '  to  distinguish  him  from  the  other  Walters  in 
the  family.  If  he  do  come  to  my  office,  I  hope  it  may  be  for  his 
good.  I  would  like  to  render  the  dear  old  captain  '  contrariwise 
blessing  '  for  not  making  me,  his  eldest  nephew,  his  executor,  instead 
of  Will  Cross,  who  is  not  a  drop's  blood  to  him,  although  a  nephew 
by  marriage. 

"  I  reached  the  dear  old  house  at  Elie  on  August  25,  1846.  I 
walked  out  to  the  Links,  near  Lady  Anstruther's  bathing  house, 
where  Harriet  and  I  had  walked  together  in  the  summer  of  1842, 
when  she  was  in  mourning  for  her  sister  Charlotte  Heyworth,  and 
wore  a  white  muslin,  with  a  black  pattern  on  it,  which  was  most 
becoming  to  her. 

"  On  Monday,  August  31,  I  was  at  Lagarie,  staying  with  my  uncle 
Alick,  in  the  beautiful  cottage  which  was  my  aunt  Walter's,  and 
would  probably  have  been  mine  had  she  not  died  suddenly  and  unex- 
pectedly. It  is  on  the  north  shore  of  the  Gareloch,  opposite  the 
Duke  of  Argyll's  seat  of  Roseneath.  I  wrote  to  Mr.  Stitt  of  Liver- 
pool, offering  my  Netherfield  Road  house  at  Everton,  Liverpool,  for 
;^22oo  sterling  cash,  or  one-third  cash  and  two-thirds  mortgage, 
with  interest  at  five  per  cent. 

"  Wednesday,  September  2,  1846.  Went  to  visit  my  sister  Mary 
and  her  husband,  Robert  Ferguson,  at  Blantyre  Lodge  on  the  Clyde, 
not  far  from  Bothwell  Castle,  the  seat  of  Lord  Douglas. 

"  On  September  9  I  went  into  Glasgow,  and,  with  Baillie  Banken, 
visited  the  Merchants'  House  Cemetery.  In  a  vault  there  belonging  to 
my  uncle  Alick  Dennistoun  are  deposited  my  mother's  remains  and 
those  of  my  father.  The  vault  is  just  southeast  of  Knox's  monu- 
ment, across  the  walk. 

"  New  Brighton,  on   the  Mersey,   opposite    Liverpool,    Saturday, 


I   COME   BACK   TO    MAKE   MY   HOME   IN   NEW   YORK.      28/ 

September  26,  1846.  I  have  just  been  packing  up  my  things  to  go 
over  to  the  Adelphi  Hotel,  Liverpool,  on  Monday,  September  28, 
and  among  my  papers  I  found  the  following  in  my  father's  hand- 
writing :  Elizabeth  Dennistoun  [my  mother],  born  August  31,  1787  ; 
Alexander  Dennistoun  [late  M.  P.  for  Dumbartonshire],  born  April 
14,  1790;  Mary  Dennistoun  [Mrs.  Walter  Wood],  born  April  16, 
1792  ;  William  Dennistoun  [died  young],  born  January  8,  1795  5 
James  Dennistoun,  born  February  4,  1799,  died  June,  1828  ;  Mar- 
garet [died  young],  born  December  8,  1800  ;  John  [M.  P.  for  Glas- 
gow], born  March  19,  1803. 

"  I  have  copied  the  above  before  sending  the  original  to  Eleanor 
(Mrs.  Alexander  Dennistoun),  in  case  I  should  die  in  America,  and  my 
children  should  have  any  curiosity  about  my  dear  mother's  family." 

On  Monday,  September  28,  1846,  I  believe  I  went  from  New 
Brighton  in  Cheshire  to  the  Adelphi  Hotel,  Liverpool,  so  as  to 
make  the  most  of  the  short  time  that  was  left  to  me  in  England  to 
perfect  my  business  and  other  arrangements. 

It  was  arranged  that  my  youngest  sister,  Eliza,  was  to  accompany 
me  to  New  York  to  take  care  of  my  house  and  help  me  to  look  after 
my  children.  This  was  not  the  sole  object  in  view,  or  I  could  not 
have  been  so  selfish  as  to  allow  her  to  leave  her  sisters  and 
other  relations,  and  come  with  me  to  '  a  strange  land.'  It  was 
deemed  best  for  her  own  comfort  and  happiness  that,  under  existing 
circumstances,  she  should  live  with  me  rather  than  with  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Ferguson  or  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Cross.  She  was  to  be  with  me  as  a 
guest,  and  not  to  contribute  in  any  way  to  my  household  expense. 
She  was  anxious  to  do  this  both  when  she  lived  with  us  in  Liverpool 
and  now,  when  she  was  going  to  live  with  me  in  New  York,  but  I 
would  not  allow  her  to  do  so. 

As  well  as  I  can  recollect  (for  I  have  no  memoranda  on  the  sub- 
ject), we  sailed  from  Liverpool  by  the  Cunard  steamer  Hibernia, 
Captain  Lott,  on  Saturday,  October  3,  1846,  for  Halifax  and  Bos- 
ton. We  had  a  very  stormy  passage.  My  old  friend  and  partner 
William  C.  Mylne  accompanied  us.  Some  fifteen  of  us  on  board 
had  a  kind  of  private  dining  room  for  ourselves,  and  one  very 
stormy  night  George  Hopley  of  Charleston  had  brewed  for  us  a 
large  tureenful  of  a  drink  made  of  brandy,  champagne,  absinthe, 
and  coffee  (it  has  a  name,  but  I  forget   it).     It  was  then  all  mixed 


288  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

together  and  set  on  fire,  being  stirred  about  by  the  maker  all  the 
time.  This  night  we  had  asked  Captain  Lott  to  come  down  to  our 
room  and  partake  of  Hopley's  brew,  which  he  did,  when,  lo  and 
behold  !  the  ship  gave  a  lurch,  the  heat  had  melted  the  soldering  of 
the  tureen,  and  its  blazing  contents  were  all  over  our  cabin.  We 
soon  got  the  blaze  put  out,  but  the  incident  gave  all  of  us  such  a 
fright  that  we  had  no  more  of  the  mixture. 

As  well  as  I  recollect,  we  arrived  at  Boston  on  October  17.  Mylne 
left  for  New  York  before  Eliza  was  out  of  her  stateroom,,  saying  to 
me  in  his  stiff  old  bachelor  way  :  "  Give  my  regards  to  Miss." 
When  Eliza  and  I  got  to  New  York,  I  took  her  down  to  Miss 
Morris'  at  New  Brighton,  S.  I.,  to  see  my  children,  and  intro- 
duce her  to  Maria  De  Peyster  and  Emily  Foster,  who  were  still 
down  on  the  island.  After  a  little  I  took  Eliza  and  my  little  band 
up  to  the  New  York  Hotel,  where  we  put  up  until  I  could  find  a 
suitable  house.  I  fixed  on  5  West  Sixteenth  Street,  which  was  quite 
new  and  had  never  been  lived  in.  It  was  built  by  a  Mr.  Oppenheim, 
and  I  rented  it  for  twelve  hundred  dollars,  which  I  recollect  Maria 
De  Peyster  thought  a  very  extravagant  rate.  It  was  thirty-four  feet 
front  and  three  stories  high,  and  an  admirable  house  in  every  way. 

"On  Monday,  December  28,  1846,  I  left  the  New  York  Hotel  for 
my  new  house.  No.  5  West  Sixteenth  Street.  Sent  off  Rachel,  the 
nurse,  with  Helen,  Willie,  Harrie,  and  Bessie,  and  a  lot  of  toys,  in  a 
coach,  which  then  returned  and  took  my  sister  Eliza,  Charlotte,  and 
John  Walter.  I  left  the  New  York  Hotel  on  foot  about  i  p.  M.  along 
with  a  cart  load  of  baggage — no  less  than  twenty-six  packages.  Went 
down  Waverly  Place  and  along  Fifth  Avenue.  Alas  !  how  differ- 
ently am  I  now  situated  from  what  I  was  when  I  left  my  house  in 
Everton  on  July  6,  1844,  with  my  beloved  Harriet  and  my  children. 
Still  I  am  surrounded  by  comforts  and  blessings.  Let  me  be  thank- 
ful and  look  upward  and  onward. 

"Tuesday,  December  29,  1846.  Arranged  my  books  in  the  evening, 
and  did  not  get  to  bed  till  2  a.  m.,  Wednesday,  December  30,  1846." 

So  end  my  memoranda  of  that  eventful  and  painful  year,  mak- 
ing a  fit  close  of  what  I  may  call  the  First  Book  of  my  Autobiog- 
raphy.    Shall  I  live  ever  to  finish  the  other  two  ?  * 

*  My  father's  death  left  his  autobiography  so  incomplete  that  a  different  arrange- 
ment of  the  volumes  has  had  to  be  made  from  that  intended  by  him. — E.  D.  Kane. 


CHAPTER  XVUI. 

A    NEW     BEGINNING     OF    LIFE A    HOME     IN    NEW    YORK     AND    A 

SECOND    WIFE, 

"Friday,  January  i,  1847.  Unpacked  my  two  portmanteaus 
entirely  ;  I  believe  the  first  time  for  two  years  and  a  half.  A  beautiful 
day.  In  the  morning  I  went  to  Dr.  Hutton's  church,  Washington 
Square,  alone,  from  whence  Harriet  was  buried  April  19,  1846.  I 
then  called  at  a  Mrs.  Scudder's  in  Broadway,  a  little  cottage  standing 
back  from  the  street  between  Eleventh  and  Twelfth  streets,  upon 
our  poor  nurse  Powell,  who  was  very  ill.  I  read  the  17th  chapter 
of  John's  Gospel  to  her,  and  repeated  Bosworth's  hymn  : 

"  '  Where'er  I  turn,  on  every  side, 
My  guilt,  O  Lord,   I  see  ; 
My  secret,  my  presumptuous  sins. 
All  testify  'gainst  me. 

Defiled,  polluted,  vile,  I  stand 

Before  thy  searching  eye  ; 
Oh  !  how  can  such  a  wrretch  as  I 

To  thee,  great  God,  draw  nigh  ? 

Unclean  !    unclean  !  on  every  side. 

Before  thy  feet  I  fall ; 
I  bare  my  heart.  Lord,  and  confess 

No  good  dwells  there  at  all. 

And  did  my  soul's  salvation  hinge 

On  anything  in  me. 
Then,  verily,  my  guilty  soul 

Should  ne'er  salvation  see. 

But  what  though  clothed  with  guilt  I  am 

As  with  a  garment  o'er, 
In  Christ,  the  spotless  Lamb  of  God, 

There's  boundless  worth  in  store. 
289 


290  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

That  worth  his  merit  all  divine 

Who  died  upon  the  tree 
Can  bring  the  vilest  near  to  God, 

And  that's  enough  for  me  ! '  * 

"  In  the  afternoon  I  went  alone  to  Greenwood  Cemetery  and  prayed 
at  Harriet's  grave. 

"Eliza  saw  company  this  ist  of  January,  and  had  thirty  callers. 
She  thought  it  slow  work. 

"January  4,  1847.  Called  and  saw  poor  Powell  in  the  afternoon. 
She  was  unconscious. 

"January  5,  1847.  Powell  died  at  8  a.  m.  Mrs.  Scudder  says  she 
smiled  sweetly  before  her  death. 

"January  6,  1847.  John  Walter  and  I  went  in  a  carriage  after 
Powell's  hearse,  and  saw  her  buried  in  a  vault  at  the  back  of  the  Car- 
mine Street  Baptist  Church.  Her  coffin  was  plain  mahogany,  no 
name  on  it." 

So  far  I  have  copied  from  my  notebook.  Now  for  some  time  I 
must  trust  to  my  memory. 

In  January  and  afterward  we  heard  from  the  newspapers 
heartrending  accounts  of  the  result  of  the  potato  famine  in 
Ireland.  My  sister  Eliza's  heart  was  greatly  stirred  by  these, 
and  she  determined  to  give  one  thousand  dollars  to  the 
New  York  Irish  Famine  Relief  Fund,  of  which  the  treasurer 
was  Robert  B.  Minturn.  She  sent  her  subscription  as  from 
"  A  Lady,"  but  the  check  she  sent  was  signed  by  Dennistoun, 
Wood  &  Co.  in  favor  of  R.  B.  Minturn,  treasurer,  and  as  it  was 
by  much  the  largest  feminine  subscription,  there  was  a  good  deal 
of  talk  about  who  this  "  lady  "  could  be.  Among  the  inquirers  was 
Mr.  Alfred  Pell,  an  intimate  friend  of  Mr.  Minturn's,  who  told  him 
whose  check  came  in  payment  of  "  A  Lady's  "  subscription.  With 
that  clew  I  presume  Mr.  Pell  had  not  much  difficulty  in  finding  out 
who  the  "lady"  was.  My  sister  had  become  acquainted  with  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Theodore  Sedgwick,  and  they  asked  lier  to  dinner  and 
invited  Mr.  Pell  to  meet  her.  He  was  a  handsome,  intelligent  man, 
a  widower  with  four  sons,  and  was  vice  president  of  some  fire  insur- 
ance company  ;  well  connected,  but  extremely  impecunious.     He 

*  March  25,  1892.  I  have  written  this  from  memory,  not  having  seen  it 
in  print,  so  far  as  I  can  recollect,  for  forty  or  fifty  years. 


A   NEW   BEGINNING   OF   LIFE.  29I 

very  soon  began  calling  upon  Eliza  and  paying  her  attention,  at 
which  I  was  not  by  any  means  pleased,  especially  as  I  fancied  Eliza 
was  not  disinclined  to  accept  his  attentions,  and,  if  she  did,  I  might 
be  left  without  any  grown-up  female  relative  in  the  house  to  look 
after  the  children.  My  diary  says  :  "  I  am  not  in  favor  of  Mr.  Pell, 
but  if  Eliza  really  did  like  him,  I  should  feel  a  delicacy  in  offering 
any  opposition,  as  it  might  be  said  that  I  did  not  want  Eliza  to 
marry  in  order  to  keep  her  money  in  the  family.  Such  an  idea  would 
be  utterly  wrong,  because  I  only  look  to  Eliza's  own  comfort  and 
happiness,  and  should  be  delighted  and  thankful  if  she  should  find 
a  man  worthy  of  her,  but  I  have  a  fear  that  Pell  feels  like  the  man 
in  Burns'  song  : 

"  '  Oh  !  gie  me  the  lass  that  has  acres  o'  charms, 
The  nice  yellow  guineas  for  me.'  " 

We  were  doing  a  very  large  business  all  the  spring  in  breadstuffs 
from  New  York  and  Canada  for  Liverpool,  which  was  apparently 
profitable,  and  kept  me  extremely  busy  all  the  time  between  Wall 
Street  and  Front  Street. 

On  March  31,  1847,  I  see  that  Mr.  and  Mrs.  David  Codwise,  Mr. 
and  Miss  Livingston,  Miss  Ellen  King,  Miss  Margaret  Lawrence,  and 
Miss  Caroline  Rowland  took  tea  at  my  house.  I  went  home  with 
Margaret  Lawrence  and  Miss  Rowland  in  the  carriage  of  the  latter; 
we  left  Margaret  at  her  father's  house  inWest  Twelfth  Street,  and  then 
I  drove  with  Miss  Rowland  to  her  father's  house  in  Washington 
Square,  left  her  there,  and  walked  home.  If  Eliza  should  leave  me, 
then  I  thought  one  or  other  of  these  young  ladies  would  make  a 
good  substitute. 

On  April  17,  1847,  I  went  out  to  Greenwood  with  Maria,  and  on 
April  22  Miss  C.  R.  called  after  dinner,  and  I  walked  home  with  her, 
I  lent  her  Punch,  and  Beckford's  "  Travels  in  Portugal,"  which  she 
returned  to  me  on  April  24,  and  on  April  26  went  to  Richmond.  On 
April  30  I  see  from  my  diary  that  I  spoke  to  Charlotte  about  the 
possibility  of  my  marrying  again,  but  I  have  no  note  or  recollection 
of  how  she  took  the  information,  which  of  course  could  not  have 
been  agreeable  to  her. 

Up  till  May  I  we  had  been  doing  an  immense  and  profitable  busi- 


292  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

ness,  and  I  thought  that  we  had  already  realized  about  one  hundred 
thousand  pounds  sterling  of  profit. 

On  Sunday,  June  6,  asked  Margaret  Lawrence  to  be  my  wife,  and 
was  accepted  by  her,  and  I  add  in  my  diary  :  "  God  Almighty  grant 
that  this  new  connection  may  prove  a  blessing  to  both  of  us,  and  to 
the  children." 

Eliza  and  I,  Willie  and  Harrie,  drove  out  with  Margaret  Lawrence  to 
her  father's  house  at  Astoria  on  June  12.  Her  aunt  Maria  De  Pey- 
ster  called  at  my  house  on  her,  and  rather  scolded  her,  telling  her 
that  the  world  would  say  she  took  me  from  interested  motives,  at 
which  poor  Margaret  wept  plentifully.  J.  Walter  and  Charlotte 
returned  home  from  Philadelphia  on  that  day  much  pleased  with 
their  visit  to  Judge  Kane — poor  Walter  with  his  arm  much  hurt, 
but  I  forget  how,  and  my  notebook  does  not  tell,  Charlotte  look- 
ing in  much  better  health.  The  house  felt  much  more  cheerful 
after  their  return. 

The  business  prospects  in  the  beginning  of  June  began  to  look 
squally,  and  I  feared  that  I  might  begin  to  experience  some  diffi- 
culty in  selling  sterling  exchange,  as  owing  to  our  large  shipments 
of  breadstuffs  we  had  been  already  large  sellers,  and  from  the  aspect 
of  the  European  grain  markets  I  began  to  fear  something  might  come 
in  the  way  to  prevent  my  marrying  Margaret  Lawrence;  but,  on  the 
other  side,  I  note  in  my  diary:  "  I  see  the  hand  of  God  in  bringing 
that  matter  about  so  far,  and  if  God  be  with  us,  who  can  be  against 
us  ?  May  he  be  with  her  and  with  me  and  with  my  dear  children, 
for  Christ's  sake." 

I  had  wanted  to  take  Eliza  and  Margaret  to  Niagara,  Canada, 
etc.,  but  found  that  it  was  impossible  for  me  to  get  away  from  the 
business,  and  by  this  time  Eliza  and  Mr.  Pell  had  become  engaged, 
and  J.  Walter,  Eliza,  Margaret  Lawrence,  and  Mr.  Pell  all  set  off  on  a 
jaunt  together  to  West  Point,  per  steamer  Alida,  then  to  the  Catskills, 
Canada,  and  Niagara  Falls.  After  their  return  from  this  jaunt,  which 
they  all  enjoyed,  I  used  frequently,  in  the  afternoon,  to  leave  Wall 
Street  about  half  past  four  and  go  by  steamboat  to  Astoria,  and  spend 
the  evening  at  Mr.  Lawrence's,  and  crossing  by  the  then  Astoria  Ferry 
to  Eighty-sixth  Street,  walk  up  it  to  Third  Avenue,  where  if  I  caught 
a  stage  which  started  from  corner  of  Eighty-sixth  Street  and  Third 
Avenue  about  every  hour  for  New  York,  good  and  well,  but  if  not  I 


A   HOME   IN   NEW   YORK   AND   A   SECOND    WIP^E.  293 

had  a  long,  dreary  walk  through  Jones'  Woods.  No  omnibuses 
or  elevated  railroads  in  those  days. 

"  July  6,  1847.  Three  years  ago  to-day  since  I  left  Liverpool 
with  my  sainted  Harriet  and  our  children.  I  went  to  Greenwood  ; 
the  roses  about  her  monument  in  full  bloom." 

I  continued  working  away  as  usual  in  my  Wall  Street  office  ; 
the  news  from  Europe  about  breadstuffs  and  business  generally  be- 
coming worse  and  worse,  but  I  find  no  entries  in  my  diary  until 
Monday,  October  4,  when  I  find  the  following:  "Received  to-day  the 
letters  by  the  Cambria  steamer  announcing  the  failures  of  D.  &  A. 
Denny,  Reid,  Irving  &  Co.,  A.  A.  Gower  &  Nephews,  and  Sanderson 
&  Co.  Also  the  resolutions  adopted  at  the  general  meeting  of  the 
partners  in  Glasgow.  I  am  mad  because  these  resolutions  make  no 
difference  between  me  and  the  others  ;  while  they  have  acted  in  an 
unbusinesslike  manner,  /  have  not.  I  feel  much  bothered  about  the 
next  news  by  the  steamer  which  will  leave  Liverpool  to-morrow,  if 
bad  news  do  not  come  sooner  by  the  French  steamer  leaving  Cher- 
bourg September  30.  I  feel  uncomfortable  about  both  the  Borough 
Bank  and  the  Union  Bank  of  Scotland,  and  J.  &  A.  Dennistoun  as 
well.  Don't  like  the  Borough  Bank  borrowing  fifty  thousand  pounds 
sterling  from  Brown,  Shipley  &  Co.  at  6^  percent,  per  annum  for 
three  months.  I  fear  that  the  Borough  may  suffer  from  Watson 
Brothers  &  Co.'s  impending  failure.  I  put  down  these  things  with 
a  view  to  see  whether  my  present  gloomy  anticipations  will  be 
realized,  as  if  anything  be  going  to  happen  to  J.  &  A.  Dennistoun 
at  present,  I  would  just  hear  of  it  before  my  marriage,  or  rather 
intended  marriage.  So  far  I  have  great  reason  to  thank  God  that 
we  have  escaped  so  well. 

"  I  have  most  kind  letters  to-day  from  my  dear  sister  Mary  and 
Aunt  Helen  regarding  my  intended  marriage,  and  also  a  kind  one 
from  John  Dennistoun. 

"  October  21,  1847.  My  thirty-ninth  birthday.  Married  to  Mar- 
garet Lawrence,  at  her  father's  house  at  Astoria,  in  the  forenoon,  by 
the  Rev.  John  Knox,  D.  D.,  of  the  Collegiate  Dutch  Church.  After 
the  ceremony  we  drove  into  town  to  my  house,  5  West  Sixteenth 
Street,  Margaret  and  I  sitting  on  the  back  seat  in  the  carriage,  and 
dear  little  Helen  on  the  front  seat  opposite  us.  In  the  afternoon  we 
started  for  Philadelphia  ;  from  thence  on  October   23  to  Baltimore." 


294  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF     WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  We  reached  Washington  Wednesday,  October  27,  and  got  back 
to  New  York  about  November  i.  On  the  evening  of  November  5, 
1847,  heard  of  the  failure  of  the  Royal  Bank  of  Liverpool,  with 
which,  and  Leyland  &  Brothers,  we  used  to  do  business  before  we 
became  connected  with  the  Borough  Bank.  The  manager  of  the 
Royal  Bank  was  Jeremiah  Chaffers,  who  had  been  head  clerk  of 
Leyland  &  Brothers,  and  who  hanged  himself  on  the  failure  of 
the  Royal  Bank.  The  newspaper  extras  of  this  evening,  November 
5,  report  fifty-frve  failures  since  the  last  steamer  sailed  ;  nothing 
said  of  the  Borough  or  of  our  people,  but  these  are  times  that  try 
men's  souls,  and  I  dread  the  letters  and  further  reports,  although  if 
either  the  Borough  or  A.  D.  &  Co.  had  gone,  they  would  certainly 
have  been  named  among  the  thirteen  failures  in  Liverpool  which 
are  specified. 

"  November  8,  1847.  I  am  in  great  fear  about  the  Borough  Bank, 
as  there  was  a  run  upon  it  on  October  19,  and  I  also  hear  from 
Brand  that  the  Scottish  banks  are  likely  to  get  into  difficulties,  so 
our  Union  friends  may  also  get  into  trouble,  and  we  through  either 
or  both  banks. 

"  November  9,  1847.  The  Washington  arrived  with  Liverpool 
dates  of  October  23.  The  run  on  the  banks  was  over  for  the  pres- 
ent. Littledale  &  Co.  of  Liverpool  have  been  carried  through  their 
troubles  by  the  Bank  of  England." 

On  November  15,  1847,  I  write  in  my  memorandum  book  : 
"  Besides  the  bother  about  the  bad  times  in  England,  I  am  now  antic- 
ipating, with  some  depression  of  spirits,  the  answer  I  am  likely  to 
get  from  my  uncles  by  the  steamer  of  November  4  to  my  letter  of 
October  7,  containing  my  remarks  on  the  resolutions,  which  were 
written  when  I  was  very  angry,  and,  therefore,  are  pretty  imperti- 
nent. When  will  I  learn  to  control  my  temper  ?  God  be  merciful 
to  me,  a  sinner." 

On  November  19,  1847,  Eliza's  engagement  to  Mr.  Pell  was 
announced. 

"Saturday,  November  20,  1847.  To-day  telegraphic  dispatches 
from  Boston  brought  the  English  news  per  steamer  Acadia.  I  was 
in  a  great  fright  that  our  people  had  gone,  as  the  telegraphic  dis- 
patch stated  that  some  of  the  oldest  houses  in  the  kingdom  had 
failed  ;    but  Colonel   Lee,  or  *  Jim  Lee,'  as    he  is  more  frequently 


A   HOME   IN   NEW   YORK   AND   A   SECOND   WIFE.  295 

and  familiarly  called,  came  in  late  in  the  evening  with  a  list  of  the 
failures,  but  none  of  our  friends  in  the  list,  thank  God  ! 

"  November  22,  1847.  Received  John  D.'s  letter  in  reply  to  mine 
about  the  resolutions  ;  fully  milder  and  better  than  I  had  any  right 
to  expect.  I  now  feel  that  when  they  think  more  of  it,  and  re- 
ceive my  letter  of  November  15,  I  may  receive  a  blowing  up. 

*'  November  25,  1847.  Thanksgiving.  Heard  a  sermon  from  Dr. 
Potts,  after  which  called  on  William  Douglas,  Philip  Hone,  Dr* 
Potts,  Mrs.  Ranken,  and  Maria  ;  my  brother  James  accompanied  me 
in  all  these  calls.  Afterward  took  a  walk  with  Margaret,  James, 
and  J.  Walter.  In  the  evening  we  went  to  Mrs.  David  Codwise's. 
Very  dull. 

"  November  30,  1847.  St.  Andrew's  Day.  My  brother  James, 
John  Walter,  and  I  dined  with  the  St.  Andrew's  Society  at  the  City 
Hotel.  The  last  time  I  dined  there,  and  the  first  time,  was  on 
December  i,  1828,  St.  Andrew's  Day  that  year  falling  on  Sunday. 
That  is  nineteen  years  ago. 

"  Friday,  December  10.  I  received  John  D.'s  letter  of  Novem- 
ber 17,  proposing  that  he  and  Uncle  Alick  should  retire  from  our 
American  firms,  and  leave  this  house,  Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co.,  to 
me  and  Dawson,  and  the  New  Orleans  house  to  W.  C.  Mylne  and 
Murray  Thomson,  and  that  I  or  Mylne  should  come  over  to  Scot- 
land as  soon  as  possible,  with  full  powers  to  make  the  necessary 
arrangements.  This  proposal  on  the  part  of  my  uncles  has  been 
a  heavy  blow  to  me,  yet  out  of  the  seeming  evil  God  may  bring 
me  good,  for  I  may  get  out  of  the  New  Orleans  house  with  its 
mortgages  and  slaves,  slave  properties  and  land  speculation.  I  wish, 
however,  that  John  and  A.  D.  would  stay  in  the  house  here(D., 
W.  &  Co.).  At  present  /  intend  to  go  over  to  Liverpool  per 
steamer  Cambria  with  Margaret,  leaving  James  or  Eliza  with  the 
children — a  sore  trial.  I  trust  God  will  direct  me  in  these  most 
important  arrangements,  and  overrule  all  for  my  spiritual  as  well 
as  temporal  good,  and  bless  and  watch  over  my  beloved  children 
during  my  absence.  News  of  the  failure  of  the  firm  (J.  &  A.  D.), 
or  Borough  or  Union  Bank  of  Scotland,  might  change  all  our  plans, 
and  these  may  come  by  some  of  the  steamers  to  arrive  before  we 
sail  on  January  29.  James  and  Eliza  went  off  on  a  trip  to  Phila- 
phia  14th  inst.  (December,  1847). 


296  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

"December  22,  1847.  Waiting  the  arrival  of  the  Hibernia 
steamer,  now  eighteen  days  out.  Fidgety  about  the  Borough  and 
Union  banks,  and  also  about  the  reply  to  my  letters  up  to  Novem- 
ber 9.  I  have  been  much  depressed  about  the  future  for  some 
time,  but  still  with  occasional  days  of  comfort  and  joy  in  believ- 
ing, and  then  again  a  sort  of  stolid  ease  from  not  thinking,  or 
thinking  in  a  different  channel.  My  precious  Harriet'  s  letters 
written  in  1844-45,  when  I  was  absent  from  her,  apply  to  the  pres- 
ent time,  and  comfort  me  much,  bringing  before  me  the  promises  of 
God,  and  showing  her  entire  trust  in  them. 

"  Friday,  December  24.  Dined  yesterday  at  Maria's  with  Mr. 
P.  L.  Mills.  No  steamer  this  morning.  What  if,  when  she  does 
arrive,  she  should  bring  news  of  the  failure  of  Henry  Monteith  & 
Co.,  of  which  Ferguson  is  a  partner,  as  well  as  of  the  Borough  and 
Union  banks,  and  of  ourselves  !  What  a  miserable  superstition  it  is 
in  me  to  write  down  these  fears  by  way  of  averting  the  calamity  ! 
I  am  truly  a  poor,  weak  creature.  God  be  merciful  to  me,  a  sinner. 
My  blessed  Harriet's  letter  to  me,  written  as  I  was  starting  for 
Arkansas  March  19,  1845,  i^  most  comforting  to  me  at  this  time. 

"  Christmas,  1847  (Saturday).  Snowy  morning.  At  4  p.  M. 
learned  that  the  Hibernia  had  arrived  at  Boston  at  3  a.  m.,  and 
brings  another  long  list  of  failures  ;  nothing,  so  far  as  I  can  ascer- 
tain, affecting  us,  thank  God.  I  called  to-day  on  Mrs.  Winthrop, 
Mrs.  Dawson,  and  Mrs.  De  Peyster.  In  the  morning  gave  the  chil- 
dren their  Christmas  gifts  ;  all  highly  delighted.  Margaret  gave  me 
the  gold  pen  with  which  I  am  now  writing. 

"  December  28,  1847.  Plans  about  going  to  Europe  all  changed 
by  John  D.'s  letter  of  December  3.  Departure  hence  put  off  till 
first  steamer  in  May,  and  then  I  go  alone,  leaving  Margaret  at  home. 
Lord  enable  us  in  all  things  to  see  thy  hand  and  to  submit  cheer- 
fully to  thy  will  !  " 

Well,  here  I  come  to  the  end  of  1847,  a  most  mingled  yarn  of 
a  year.  Up  till  May  things  all  going  well,  and  large  apparent 
profits  made — something  like  one  hundred  thousand  pounds  sterling. 
Then  everything  began  to  go  wrong  ;  hundreds  of  failures  in 
Europe,  but  we  not  only  escaped,  but  at  the  end  of  the  year  saved 
some  ten  thousand  pounds  sterling  out  of  the  fancied  profits  of  one 
hundred  thousand  pounds  made  up  to  May  i.     We  were  living  in  a 


A   HOME   IN   NEW   YORK   AND   A   SECOND   WIFE.  297 

most  delightful  house,  some  thirty-three  feet  wide  and  three  stories 
high  ;  opposite  us  Colonel  Thorn's  handsome  mansion,  with  its  fine 
fountain  and  garden  in  front,  now  (1892)  forming  part  of  the  New 
York  Hospital.  There  was  a  balcony  in  front  of  the  drawing-room 
windows  on  West  Sixteenth  Street,  with  Michigan  roses  and  honey- 
suckles twined  up  it,  and  in  front  of  the  house  and  at  the  edge  of 
the  pavement  I  planted  three  Paulownia  imperialis  trees.  At  first 
these  were  mere  long,  slender  poles,  but  before  I  left  the  house,  in 
1862,  large  umbrageous  trees,  with  great  clusters  of  purple  blossoms 
in  spring.  At  that  time  the  flow  of  Croton  water  was  so  strong  and 
abundant  that  with  the  hose  we  could  throw  up  water  to  the  top  of 
the  house.  At  the  back  of  the  house  was  a  little  garden,  where  I 
planted  a  vine,  which  bore  an  abundant  crop  of  black  grapes  every 
year,  and  from  the  back  windows,  looking  north,  we  could  see  clear 
up  to  the  top  of  Murray  Hill  ;  no  intervening  house  but  Richard 
Irvin's  and  Mr.  Walden  Pell's,  in  West  Twenty-first  Street. 


CHAPTER    XIX. 

JOURNEY    TO    EUROPE    IN    1852. 

"  January  i,  1848.  I  paid  twenty-nine  New  Year's  calls  to-day, 
although  the  weather  was  misty  ;  and  Margaret  and  Charlotte  re- 
ceived seventy  odd  calls.     James  and  Eliza  returned  in  the  evening. 

"January  12,  1848.  My  present  feelings  of  depression  are  some- 
thing akin  to  those  I  had  in  August,  September,  and  October,  1844, 
at  Glen  Cove,  having  little  work  to  do  at  present,  but  with  changes 
and  disagreeables  in  prospect.  Yet  out  of  all  my  former  troubles 
the  Lord  delivered  me,  and  so  may  he  out  of  these.  I  have  the 
experience  of  his  former  mercies  to  cheer  and  comfort  me.  I  have 
a  good  house  and  I  am  pleasantly  settled,  which  we  were  not  then. 
My  blessed  Harriet  has  been  taken  by  our  heavenly  Father,  and  is 
beyond  the  reach  of  trials  and  sorrows  here.  I  wish  I  could  make 
poor  Margaret  as  happy  as  I  made  her  !  " 

After  getting  from  Mr.  Pell  satisfaction  pieces  from  his  various 
creditors,  and  having  a  settlement  drawn  up  and  signed  by  my  sister 
Eliza  and  him,  settling  all  her  property  on  trustees,  and  all  she 
might  acquire  hereafter  on  said  trustees,  of  whom  I  was  one  and 
factor  of  her  estate,  I  consented  to  her  marriage  with  Mr.  Alfred 
Pell,  and  they  were  married  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Potts  in  the  back 
drawing  room  of  my  house,  5  West  Sixteenth  Street,  on  February 
17,  1848. 

"  Monday,  March  6,  1848.  I  secured  a  stateroom  for  myself  in 
the  new  steamer  America,  hence  for  Liverpool  on  April  19.  Her 
day  of  sailing  is  the  second  anniversary  of  my  blessed  Harriet's 
funeral.  Will  this  voyage  prove  my  last  ?  This  (March  6)  is  the 
night  of  the  great  fancy  ball  at  the  opera." 

Here  end  my  notes,  and  I  have  to  trust  to  my  memory  for  what 
follows,  with  the  exception  of  what  may  be  in  print. 

On  April  19,  1848,  there  was  a  heavy  snowstorm  and  the  snow 
was  three  inches  deep  on  a  level.  Margaret,  J.  Walter,  Charlotte, 
and  I  set  off  in  a  coach  for  Jersey  City,  I  to  embark  in  the  steamer 

298 


JOURNEY   TO   EUROPE   IN    1852.  299 

America  for  Liverpool.  It  was  very  rough  crossing  the  Hudson,  and 
the  snow  falling  heavily,  and  altogether  a  wretched  day  to  embark 
on  an  Atlantic  voyage,  and  to  part  from  my  wife  and  children.  It 
blew  so  hard  that  the  America  with  her  own  power  could  not  get  out 
of  her  dock,  and  had  to  get  the  aid  of  a  tugboat.  At  last  we  got 
fairly  into  the  stream  and  held  our  course  for  Sandy  Hook.  I  found 
one  of  my  fellow-passengers  was  my  old  Liverpool  acquaintance 
Henry  Eyre,  now  settled  in  New  York  like  myself.  He  is  a  high 
Tory  and  Protectionist,  and  I  always  a  Radical  and  Free  Trader,  so 
we  had  it  hot  and  heavy  during  the  voyage.  At  that  time  there  was 
some  misunderstanding  between  England  and  France,  and  when  we 
made  the  south  coast  of  Ireland  and  were  boarded  by  some  fisher- 
men or  pilots,  we  were  told  that  English  ships  of  war  were  cruising 
off  the  Irish  coast  to  prevent  any  attack  from  French  war  vessels, 
and  that  American  sympathizers  with  Ireland  might  be  arrested. 
Henry  Eyre,  I  recollect,  said  in  a  half  joke  that  he  thought  he 
would  be  obliged  to  denounce  me  when  we  got  to  Liverpool.  I  have 
no  particular  recollection  of  what  I  did  there,  but  I  think  I  went 
at  once  to  Glasgow  and  to  my  uncle  Alick's  house  (Golf  Hill).  I 
found  Aunt  Eleanor,  his  wife,  confined  to  bed  and  very  ill.  She 
did  not  see  me,  partly  from  being  ill,  and  partly,  I  think,  from  being 
disgusted  at  my  remarriage  so  soon,  as  she  was  a  great  friend  and 
admirer  of  Harriet.  From  Golf  Hill,  after  attending  to  business 
matters  in  Glasgow,  I  went  to  Elie,  and  my  cousin  Eleanor  accom- 
panied me  there,  so  her  mother  could  not  then  have  been  danger- 
ously ill.  I  recollect  I  took  her  to  Kincraig  Braes  and  the  Caves  ; 
but  beyond  that  I  have  no  recollection  of  anything  that  occurred  at 
Elie.  From  Elie  I  went  on  a  visit  to  my  sister  Mary  and  Mr.  Fer- 
guson at  Blantyre  Priory  near  Glasgow.  Mr.  Ferguson  was  in  very 
delicate  health  when  I  arrived  there  early  in  July,  and  the  night 
before  I  had  to  leave  for  Liverpool  to  catch  the  steamer  for  New 
York,  he  died.  I  was  up  with  him  all  night,  but  had  to  leave  next 
morning.  I  cannot  recollect  the  exact  date,  but  I  know  I  reached 
New  York  not  too  soon,  for  Margaret  had  her  first  child  born 
August  I,  1848,  and  named  Robert  Ferguson,  after  my  friend  and 
brother-in-law. 

I  asked  Mary  and  her  daughters,  Elizabeth  and   Grace,  to  come 
out  here  and  pay  us  a  visit,  which  they  did  in  September,  and   liked 


300  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

New  York  so  well  that  they  decided  to  spend  the  winter  here,  and 
took  rooms  in  what  is  now  the  Morton  House,  facing  Union  Square. 
Mary's  company  and  that  of  her  two  daughters  was  a  very  great 
pleasure  to  all  of  us.  She,  Eliza,  Margaret,  and  Charlotte  got  on 
well  together,  as  did  Charlotte  and  my  younger  children  with  her  two 
girls.  There  were  constant  little  visits  between  the  two  sets  of 
children  in  the  winter  of  1848-49. 

In  the  spring  of  1849  there  came  from  Bermuda  and  introduced 
himself  to  me  the  Rev.  H.  B.  Tristram,  a  young  Episcopal  clergy- 
man, who  had  been  chaplain  to  her  Majesty's  forces  in  Bermuda  for 
about  three  years.  His  own  mother  died  about-  the  time  of  his 
birth,  and  about  a  year  and  a  half  afterward  his  father  married  my 
second  cousin,  Miss  Anne  Wood  of  Edinburgh,  eldest  daughter  of 
my  father's  cousin,  Henry  Wood,  and  his  wife.  Young  Tristram 
never  knew  any  other  mother  than  his  stepmother,  to  whom  he  was 
very  filially  attached.  I  got  him  invited  by  Dr.  Bedell  to  preach  at 
the  Church  of  the  Ascension,  which  he  did,  and  in  the  course  of  his 
sermon,  forgetting  where  he  was,  spoke  of  "our  gracious  sovereign 
lady,  Queen  Victoria."  He  was  a  very  pleasant  fellow,  and  made 
himself  agreeable  to  the  Ferguson  girls.  That  was  in  the  spring  of 
1849.  Early  in  July,  1891,  on  a  Sunday,  a  card  was  sent  up  to  my 
bedroom  with  "  Canon  Henry  B.  Tristram  "  on  it.  I  went  to  the 
drawing  room  and,  entering,  I  said  :  "  It  is  a  long  time  since  I  saw 
you,  Canon  ;  it  must  be  twenty  years."  "  Why,"  said  he,  "  Mr.  Wood, 
it's  a  great  deal  more  than  that  ;  it's  forty-one  years  !  "  He  had  left 
Durham  Cathedral,  of  which  he  has  long  been  Resident  Canon,  for 
Japan  on  January  31,  1891,  to  which  country  he  went  via  Red  Sea, 
Ceylon,  India,  and  China.  He  spent  nearly  three  months  in  Japan 
with  one  of  his  daughters,  who  is  head  of  the  educational  depart- 
ment of  the  Church  of  England  Mission  there.  From  that  country 
he  crossed  the  Pacific  to  Vancouver,  B.  C,  and  thence  by  rail  to 
New  York.  He  visited  Washington  in  quest  of  rare  ornithological 
specimens,  came  back  here  and  spent  five  days  with  us,  then  crossed 
the  Atlantic,  and  got  home  to  Durham,  after  going  round  the  world 
and  spending  along  time  in  Japan,  in  six  months.  He  is  F.  R.  S., 
D.  D.,  and  LL.  D.,  a  great  ornithologist,  and  traveler  in  Moab  and 
other  Eastern  countries,  and  withal  a  most  agreeable,  unaffected 
gentleman. 


JOURNEY   TO   EUROPE   IN    1852.  301 

In  the  summer  of  1849  my  sister  Mary,  her  two  daughters,  and 
James  traveled  in  Canada,  to  Niagara,  etc.,  and  returned  to  England 
I  think  in  September. 

Margaret  and  I  and  the  children  went  to  the  "Pavilion,"  kept  by 
Blancard,  north  side  of  Staten  Island,  for  the  summer  of  1849. 
Margaret  was  very  much  admired  by  the  guests  at  Blancard's  table, 
for  we  and  the  elder  children  dined  daily  at  the  table  d'hote  j  but 
the  rather  pleasant  early  part  of  the  summer  was  sadly  interrupted 
on  July  9,  1849,  by  the  death  of  little  Robert  Ferguson  when  still 
twenty-two  days  under  a  year  old.  This  was  a  great  blow  to  poor 
Margaret.  I  think  we  remained  at  Blancard's  till  some  time  in 
August,  and  returned  to  town  to  see  Mary  and  her  two  daughters  off 
to  England. 

All  the  letter  books,  ledgers,  etc.,  of  Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co. 
were  sent  to  Glasgow  when  the  firm  was  dissolved,  and  I  have  no 
private  notes  of  what  sort  of  a  business  we  were  now  doing,  but  I 
think  it  was  about  this  time,  or  in  1848,  that  we  retired  from  the 
cotton  and  breadstuff  markets,  and  devoted  ourselves  exclusively  to 
banking  business,  issuing  credits,  etc.,  etc.,  which  change  proved 
to  be  satisfactory  and  profitable. 

On  February  11,  1850,  Margaret  Augusta  was  born,  a  very  beau- 
tiful little  girl.  She  was  baptized  by  Dr.  Vermilye  at  5  West 
Sixteenth  Street  on  June  16,  1850. 

Having  lost  little  Alick  in  the  summer  of  1846  at  New  Brighton, 
S.  I.,  and  little  Robert  Ferguson  in  the  same  vicinity  in  July, 
1849,  we  considered  the  place  unhealthy,  and  so  in  July,  1850, 
we  went  to  the  Ocean  Hotel  at  Newport,  R.  I.,  where  we  spent 
several  weeks  delightfully,  enjoying  the  surf  bathing  and  the  fine 
sea  air,  which  reminded  me  of  Elie,  and  I  was  so  pleased  with  the 
place  that  I  mentally  vowed  I  would  return  every  summer,  but  I 
have  never  been  there  since  (now  April  7,  1892).  I  used  to  take 
Helen  under  one  arm,  and  Cortlandt  Field  under  the  other,  and  carry 
them  out  into  the  surf,  set  them  down  in  it,  and  let  them  scuttle 
ashore.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  B.  H.  Field,  Cortlandt's  parents,  were  there 
that  season  ;  Mrs.  Field  was  a  half  sister  of  Frederic  De  Peyster,  and 
a  very  agreeable  and  handsome  woman.  During  our  stay  at  Newport 
Beach  Lawrence,  a  cousin  of  Margaret's  father,  gave  us  a  grand 
dinner  at  his  house  on  the  cliffs,  and  to  meet  us  he  had  Dr.  Eastburn, 


302  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

an  Englishman,  and  Bishop  of  Massachusetts,  a  most  intelligent, 
agreeable  man,  with  whom  I  recollect  after  dinner  I  had  a  long  talk, 
sitting  on  the  piazza  and  looking  seaward,  de  omnibus  rebus  et 
quibusdam  aliis. 

On  returning  from  Newport  we  went  home  to  5  West  Sixteenth 
Street,  where,  so  far  as  I  recollect,  things  went  on  comfortably,  and 
business  in  Wall  Street  was  good,  no  noteworthy  thing  occurring  till 
after  the  end  of  1850. 

On  May  29,  185 1,  a  son  was  born  to  us  whom  we  called  Dennistoun, 
after  my  mother;  he  was  baptized  by  Dr.  Potts  November  20,  185 1. 

Toward  the  end  of  July,  185 1,  we  took  a  cottage  in  the  grounds 
of  the  Pavilion  Hotel  at  Fort  Hamilton,  living  in  the  cottage,  but 
taking  our  meals  in  the  hotel.  Our  cottage  was  situated  on  a 
bluff  overlooking  the  lower  bay.  A  lame  gentleman,  Mr.  Henry 
James,  father  of  the  novelist  of  the  same  name,  spent  the  summer  at 
the  hotel  with  us;  he  was  a  very  well  educated,  intelligent  man,  who 
held  peculiar  religious  opinions  not  unlike  those  of  the  Sandemanians, 
so  I  had  a  good  deal  of  pleasant  conversation  with  him.  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Wm.  H.  Neilson  spent  that  summer  at  Bath,  not  far  from  us, 
and  Neilson  used  to  go  up  to  New  York  every  morning  from  Fort 
Hamilton  in  the  same  boat  I  did. 

Bessie  and  Harriet  had  a  good  deal  of  intercourse  with  the  two 
Misses  Delafield,  daughters  of  the  then  Colonel  Delafield  who  was 
commandant  of  Fort  Wadsworth  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  Narrows. 
The  girls  used  to  row  across  to  see  each  other.  We  also  had  more  than 
one  visit  from  Thomas  L.  Kane  (Cousin  Tom),  who,  even  as  early  as 
this,  began  to  manifest  a  partiality  for  my  daughter  Bessie,  his  future 
wife.  I  used  to  go  up  and  down  daily  to  and  from  New  York,  and 
thoroughly  enjoyed  the  delicious  salt  air  of  the  lower  bay  after  the  hot 
city.  Toward  the  earlier  part  of  August  pretty  little  Margaret  Augusta 
began  to  sicken  with  dysentery  and  fever,  and  tossed  about  on  her  little 
bed  in  great  pain,  twisting  her  slender  fingers  in  her  long  curly  hair, 
and  matting  it  together.  She  was  mainly  attended  by  Elizabeth  Joy, 
a  Scotswoman,  who,  with  her  sister  Jane,  came  recommended  to  us  by 
my  sister  Mrs.  Ferguson.  The  former  went  by  the  name  of  "  fat 
Elizabeth."  Margaret  being  a  nursing  mother,  and  less  than  three 
months  confined,  soon  got  knocked  up  with  the  night  watching  of 
poor  little   Maggie,    and  the  latter  part  of  it  fell  on  me  and  "  fat 


JOURNEY   TO   EUROPE   IN    1 852.  303 

Elizabeth."  One  of  these  nights  it  was  full  moon,  and  just  down  below 
our  cottage,  and  Maggie's  room,  was  a  wharf,  at  the  end  of  which, 
that  night,  tied  by  a  rope,  and  awaiting  the  coroner's  inquest,  was  a 
dead  body,  which  all  night  long  kept  swaying  up  and  down  with  the 
motion  of  the  waves — a  weird  and  dismal  sight. 

Margaret  Augusta  died  September  3,  185 1.  We  returned  to  5 
West  Sixteenth  Street  with  baby  Dennistoun,  and  spent  the  winter 
of  1851-52  there.  I  have  no  recollection  of  any  particular  event 
occurring  until  the  spring  of  1852,  when  I  decided  to  go  to  Europe 
with  Margaret,  the  baby,  and  Bessie,  and  "  fat  Elizabeth  "  as  nurse. 
Bessie  was  at  that  time  engaged  to  her  future  husband,  Thomas  L, 
Kane,  or  "  Cousin  Tom,"  as  he  was  usually  called. 

We  sailed  June  26,  1852,  from  New  York  for  Liverpool  in  the 
Baltic,  Captain  Comstock,  who  was  landlord  of  the  New  York  Hotel 
when  we  were  there,  1845  and  1846.  This  date  I  find  in  an  old 
account  book.  Among  our  passengers  were  Mr.  and  Mme.  Pulsky, — 
he  was  Kossuth's  secretary, — and  they  two  danced  the  real  mazourka 
at  a  ball  on  July  4,  on  deck,  for  the  benefit  of  the  passengers.  There 
were  also  on  board  Miss  Haines,  who  kept  a  good  and  fashionable 
school  in  East  Twenty-first  Street,  and  her  excellent  sister,  Mrs. 
Doremus,  the  mother  of  the  professor.  Mme.  Celeste,  the  dancer, 
was  also  on  board,  apparently  a  very  respectable  woman  ;  also  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Barney  Williams,  the  comic  actors  ;  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Tom 
Hoppin  and  a  brother,  Judge  Hoppin,  relations  of  my  friend  Mrs. 
May  Humphreys,  from  whom  I  think  they  had  a  letter  of  introduc- 
tion to  me.  We  reached  Liverpool  and  Radley's  Hotel  July  7,  in 
the  very  middle  of  an  election  day,  and  had  great  difficulty  in  finding 
a  carriage  to  take  us  from  the  ship  to  the  hotel.  We  were  given  an 
excellent  parlor  facing  on  the  open  space  in  front,  and  just  as  we 
had  got  settled  in  burst  an  election  party  to  speechify  to  the  crowd 
outside,  greatly  to  Margaret's  disgust,  who  knew  nothing  of  the 
license  which  prevails  or  did  prevail  in  English  parliamentary  elec- 
tions. My  sister  Anna  Cross  and  her  family  were  staying  at  a 
country  place  near  Liverpool  called  St.  Michael's  Mount.  Cross  and 
I  went  into  Liverpool  every  morning,  coming  out  in  the  afternoon, 
and  he  and  I  renewed  the  days  of  our  youth  on  the  lawn  there  play- 
ing at  leap-frog,  to  the  great  amusement  of  our  wives  and  children. 
I  was  forty-four  and  Cross,  I  think,  a  little  younger. 


304  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

We  stayed  in  Liverpool  six  days.  From  there  we  went  to  London, 
and  put  up  at  a  very  comfortable  but  not  very  fashionable  hotel,  the 
British  Hotel,  Cockspur  Street.  John  Dennistoun  was  in  Lon- 
don, but  Aunt  Fanny,  his  wife,  was  in  Paris.  He  gave  Margaret  and 
me  a  dinner  at  the  Star  and  Garter,  Richmond,  to  which  he  drove 
out  a  Miss  "  Gina  "  Oakley,  a  daughter  of  Sir  Charles  Oakley,  who 
had  been  British  Minister  at  Washington.  Miss  Oakley  was  a  very 
handsome  girl.  She  subsequently  married  my  cousin  Alexander 
Dennistoun,  son  of  Uncle  Alick,  and  their  second  daughter  married 
my  uncle  John  D.'s  son  John. 

My  little  Bessie  was  at  the  dinner  with  us,  and  a  Captain  Camp- 
bell, who  was  attentive  to  Miss  Oakley.  I  remember  that  Captain 
C,  being  asked  what  part  of  the  chicken  he  would  have,  replied  : 
"  The  leg."  John  D.  asked  why  he  chose  that  part,  to  which  he 
replied  :  "  I  am  a  younger  son,  and  as  a  boy  I  always  had  that  part, 
and  now  I  prefer  it  to  any  other." 

We  took  Bessie  to  the  Tower,  Mme.  Tussaud's  Waxworks,  and 
the  British  Museum.  John  D.  took  us  to  the  Houses  of  Parliament, 
Westminster  Abbey,  St.  Paul's,  and  so  forth  ;  also  to  see  the  first 
performance  of  an  opera  of  "  Faust  "  (Spohr's  ?)  at  Covent  Gar- 
den. When  it  was  over,  coming  out,  I  was  mistaken  for  Sir  Charles 
Wood,  afterward  Lord  Halifax,  and  "  Lady  Wood's  carriage  stops 
the  way  "  was  called  out,  to  our  great  edification.  We  also  visited 
Hampton  Court.  I  wrote  on  July  20  \.o  \.\\q  proprietaire  oi  Meurice's 
Hotel,  Paris,  saying  that  I  would  be  there  with  my  family  on  Thurs- 
day, July  22,  and  wanting  a  parlor,  two  bedrooms  adjoining  each 
other,  with  two  beds  and  a  crib  in  one  room. 

From  London  we  went  to  Paris,  I  think  by  the  S.  E.  R.  R.  At 
Folkestone  James  M.  Graves,  M.  P.,  introduced  himself  to  me.  I 
had  not  met  him  for  over  fifteen  years.  From  Folkestone  we  went  to 
Boulogne,  and  put  up  at  The  Hotel  Bragden,  and  thence  to  Meurice's, 
Paris.  We  had  intended  to  go  from  Paris  to  Holland,  but  baby 
Dennistoun  was  taken  sick,  and  so  we  had  to  remain  in  Paris.  Sev- 
eral goats  used  to  be  driven  to  the  hotel  door  every  morning  to  be 
milked  for  his  small  lordship.  We  visited  the  Louvre,  and  on 
August  2  Versailles  and  St.  Germains.  We  were  at  the  Palais  de 
Justice,  where  we  were  particularly  struck  by  the  handsome  appear- 
ance and  bearing  of  the   lawyers   in   their  govvns  and   square   caps. 


JOURNEY   TO    EUROPE   IN    1 852.  305 

We  also  visited  the  Invalides  and  saw  Napoleon  I.'s  tomb.  And 
one  day,  probably  July  29,  I  took  Margaret  and,  I  think,  Bessie  out 
in  an  open  carriage.  Coming  home  through  the  Rue  Rivoli  we 
encountered  a  great  military  procession,  headed  by  the  Prince-Presi- 
dent Douis  Napoleon  (afterward  emperor.)  Our  carriage  had  to 
stand  still  while  the  soldiers  passed,  and  glad  [1  was  when  they  /lad 
passed,  for  their  admiration  for  Margaret's  handsome  face  was  too 
manifest  to  be  pleasant.  We  had  a  full  view  of  Louis  Napoleon, 
with  his  waxed  mustache.     He  was  in  an  open  carriage  and  sat  high. 

Another  day  Margaret,  Bessie,  and  I  dined  at  the  Trois  Freres 
Provenfaux,  and  had  one  of  the  great  Bonaparte's  favorite  wines, 
made  from  frozen  grapes,  and  found  it  quite  as  strong  as  was  good 
for  us.  One  evening  we  went  to  the  opera,  and  in  a  box  below  us 
whom  should  we  see  but  Stuart  Brown  and  his  family,  he  being  a 
very  strict  Episcopalian. 

From  Paris  we  returned  to  Boulogne,  and  crossed  from  there  to 
Folkestone,  where  we  arrived  August  5,  in  the  afternoon,  and  put 
up  at  the  Pavilion  Hotel.  We  remained  a  day  or  two,  and  then 
took  our  way  to  Malvern,  halting  in  London  at  the  British  Hotel. 
We  went  to  visit  my  sweet  sister  Mary  Ferguson  at  Malvern,  stay- 
ing at  the  Foley  Arms,  where  we  spent  a  very  happy  week  with  her 
and  Grace,  and,  I  think,  part  of  the  time,  her  elder  daughter,  Eliza- 
beth (Mrs.  Gibbon).  We  did  a  good  deal  of  climbing  the  Malvern 
Hills.  On  our  way  to  Malvern  we  crossed  a  bridge  near  Worcester, 
and  recognized  Tennyson's 

"League  of  grass,  washed  by  a  slow,  broad  stream," 

From  Malvern  we  traveled  north  to  York,  where  we  spent  a  night 
at  the  old  Royal  Hotel,  not  being  able  to  get  into  any  better  one, 
owing  to  the  races  having  filled  them.  The  old  landlord  of  the 
Royal  offered  himself  in  marriage  to  our  fat  nurse  Elizabeth,  who 
would  not  have  him.  We  visited  York  Minster,  which  we  greatly 
admired,  and  climbed  one  of  its  towers,  from  which  we  saw  Scot- 
land in  the  distance.  From  thence  in  ancient  times  the  Archbishop 
of  York  and  his  officials  could  descry  the  Scottish  marauders  on  the 
way  to  make  a  raid  on  the  archiepiscopal  city  and  take  measures  to 
foil  the  attempt. 

From  York   we  journeyed  to    Newcastle-upon-Tyne,    where   we 


306  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

spent  a  night  at  a  fine  new  railroad  hotel.  From  Newcastle- 
upon-Tyne  we  went  northward  to  Carlisle,  and  put  up  at  an 
old-fashioned  inn,  where  his  Majesty's  mail  used  to  change  horses, 
and  going  south  from  Scotland  stopped  for  dinner,  and  north 
from  England  stopped  for  breakfast  ;  both  meals  excellent.  The 
name  of  the  hotel  was  The  Bush,  which  I  must  have  stopped 
at  twenty  times  at  least,  I  suppose.  In  the  large  hall  there 
were  full-length  pictures  of  the  English  soldiers  as  they  appeared 
in  their  1745  uniforms.  It  was  here  that  baby  Denny  uttered  his 
first  word,  which  was  "  Carlisle,"  very  distinctly.  We  went  on  Sun- 
day to  the  service  in  the  old  cathedral,  and  in  the  body  of  the 
church  was  a  red-coated  regiment  in  full  uniform,  and  its  soldiers 
appeared  to  admire  Margaret  as  much  as  the  French  soldiers  did  in 
Paris. 

From  Carlisle  we  went  north,  passing  through  Berwick-upon- 
Tweed,  which,  being  at  the  Union  in  possession  of  England,  although 
on  the  Jiorth  of  the  Tweed,  and  therefore  geographically  in  Scot- 
land, was  at  the  Union  held  to  belong  to  England,  and  was  there- 
fore ecclesiastically  Episcopalian,  and  under  the  Bishop  of  Carlisle. 
It  returned  two  members  to  Parliament,  who  did  not  count  among 
the  Scottish  M.  P.'s.  Thus  this  comparatively  insignificant  place 
returned  two  M.  P.'s,  while  my  native  city  of  Glasgow,  the  largest 
in  Scotland,  up  till  1832  only  returned  one-fourth  of  an  M.  P., 
Rutherglen,  Renfrew,  and  Dumbarton  returning  each  also  one- 
fourth,  and  so  making  up  a  whole  member  among  them. 

Our  railroad  ran  near  the  German  Ocean  all  the  way  to  Edin- 
burgh, and  the  scenery  was  both  beautiful  and  interesting.  We  saw 
en  route  the  old  house  of  Bemerside,  of  whose  owners  Thomas  the 
Rhymer  prophesied  one  thousand  years  ago  or  more  : 

"  Betide,  betide,  whate'er  betide, 
Haig  shall  be  Haig  of  Bemerside." 

And  so  they  were  up  to  1852,  at  any  rate,  and  may  be  yet  (1892), 
for  anything  I  know  to  the  contrary.  The  road  took  us  to  the  south 
of  the  Isle  of  May  and  to  the  south  of  the  Bass  Rock,  and  near 
Tantallon  Castle,  the  ancient  seat  of  the  Douglases,  all  of  which  I 
had  so  often  seen  from  Elie  on  their  north  side. 

On  arriving  at  Edinburgh  we   went  to  a  very  nice  private  hotel, 


JOURNEY   TO   EUROPE   IN    1 852.  307 

kept  by  a  Mr.  Beach,  and  recommended  to  us  for  good  Scottish 
cookery  by  my  sister  Mrs.  Ferguson,  who  had  spent  a  winter  there 
with  her  husband  and  family.  The  morning  after  our  arrival  I  sent 
for  the  head  waiter,  told  him  my  wife  was  an  American,  and  that 
his  hotel  (in  Queen  Street)  had  been  recommended  to  me  for  good 
Scottish  cookery,  and  I  wanted  a  regular  Scotch  dinner — hotch- 
potch, salmon,  haggis,  and  partan  pie.  He  replied  :  "  Oo,  sir,  that 
was  the  auld  Mrs.  Beach  that  was  sae  guid  a  Scotch  cook  ;  but  she's 
deed,  and  he's  gane  an'  married  a  sooth-land  lassie  that  kens  nae 
mair  aboot  a  haggis  than  a  haggis  kens  aboot  her  !  "  This  was  not 
a  very  promising  lookout  for  a  good  Scottish  dinner,  but  the  cynical 
old  head  waiter  belied  the  "  sooth-land  lassie,"  for  we  had  all  the 
Scottish  dishes  in  perfection. 

Next  day  being  Sunday,  we  went  to  the  celebrated  Dr.  Guthrie's 
church,  and  were  ushered  into  a  sitting  room,  where  we  had  to  wait 
in  order  to  ascertain  whether  there  were  any  room  for  us  in  the 
church.     There  was  none,  so  we  had  to  return  to  the  hotel. 

Next  day  we  started  for  Elie  by  steamer  to  Kinghorn  in  Fife,  and 
thence  by  four-horse  stage  to  Elie.  In  James  VI. 's  time  my  great- 
great-great-great-grandfather,  the  Rev.  James  Scrymgeour,  was  min- 
ister of  Kinghorn,  and  also  one  of  his  Majesty's  chaplains,  and 
accompanied  him  when  he  journeyed  to  bring  home  his  very  ugly 
queen,  Anne  of  Denmark,  of  whom  there  is  a  likeness  in  my  copy 
of  the  "  Life  of  Lord  Herbert  of  Cherbury."  I  had  secured  the 
whole  of  the  inside  of  the  coach  for  Mrs.  Wood,  myself,  Bessie, 
"  fat  Elizabeth,"  and  baby  Dennistoun,  when,  lo  and  behold  !  my 
second  cousin  Grace  Wood  begged  of  us  at  Kinghorn  to  make 
room  for  her,  otherwise  she  would  be  detained  a  day  at  Kinghorn. 
She  was  a  handsome  girl,  and  I  assented  perhaps  on  that  very 
account.  Another  party  in  interest  "  did  it  grudgingly  and  of 
necessity."  I  was  delighted  to  point  out  on  our  journey  those 
Druidical  monuments  "  the  Stannin'  Stanes  o'  Lundie,"  the  Bass 
Rock,  North  Berwick  Law,  and  the  Isle  of  May  as  we  drove  along 
the  shores  of  Largo  Bay.  The  Bass  Rock  always  seemed  right 
before  us,  as  it  rose  in  the  center  of  Largo  Bay,  the  curve  of  whose 
shore  we  were  following.  The  Isle  of  May  had  additional  charms 
to  me  besides  its  beautiful  position  in  the  mouth  of  the  Firth  of 
Forth,  as  it  was  off  its  shores  that  my  ancestor   Sir  Andrew  Wood, 


308  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

on  August  8,  1490,  captured  the  largest  ship  in  Henry  VII. 's  navy, 
the  Hen7'i  Grace  a  Dieu,  with  his  two  small  vessels  the  Flower  and 
the  Yellow  Caravel,  for  which  deed  James  IV.  of  Scotland  gave  him 
the  English  ship  for  his  crest,  with  the  motto  "  Tutus  in  Undis,"  and 
a  tree  between  the  two  little  ships  the  Flotver  and  Yellow  Caravel  on 
the  shield.  That  is  what  is  called  a  punning  motto,  Wood  being 
always  safe  on  the  waters. 

We  remained  several  days  in  Elie,  but  my  impression  is  that 
Margaret  did  not  take  much  interest  in  the  place,  but  that  Bessie 
did.  From  Elie  we  found  our  way  to  Stirling  Castle,  and  from  Elie 
we  went  to  Perth,  and  like  Wordsworth,  on  the  way:' 

"  From  Stirling  Castle  we  had  seen 
The  mazy  Forth  unravel'd." 

While  in  Perth,  "  fat  Elizabeth "  taking  out  baby  Dennistoun  to 
give  him  a  walk,  went  into  a  shop  to  buy  something,  and,  enter- 
ing into  conversation  with  the  woman  of  the  shop,  told  her 
that  he  was  an  American  baby.  Whereat  she  was  greatly  sur- 
prised, for  she  thought  that  all  Americans  were  black.  We  greatly 
admired  the  "  Inches  "  or  meadows  of  the  Tay  at  Perth,  remembering 
the  exclamations  of  the  Roman  soldiers  when  they  came  in  sight  of 
them  :  "  Ecce  Tiberis  J  ecce  Camptis  Martins  !  "  (I  have  my  doubts 
whether  that  be  correct  Latin  or  not.) 

From  Perth  I  think  we  went  to  the  Trosachs,  and  somehow  to 
Loch  Lomond  and  along  the  south  shore,  and  so  on  to  Helensburgh 
and  Uncle  Alick's  place  on  the  Gareloch  opposite  the  Duke  of 
Argyll's  palace  of  Roseneath,  At  the  head  of  the  Gareloch  are  the 
rugged,  but  most  picturesque  mountains  called  the  Duke  of 
Argyll's    Bowling  Green.     We   enjoyed  Uncle   Alick's   hospitality. 

While  at  Lagarie  there  came  another  American  bride,  with  her 
husband,  who  Avas  very  "  camsteary,"  and  when  taken  to  Loch 
Lomond  determinedly  shut  her  eyes  and  would  not  look  at  the 
beautiful  scenery.  I  have  understood  that  when  she  became  older 
and  got  more  sense  she  made  a  very  good  wife  and  mother,  but  I 
never  saw  her  again. 

From  Lagarie  we  went  to  Glasgow  to  attend  a  business  meeting 
of  the  partners,  and  put  up  at  some  hotel  in  George  Square.  From 
Glasgow  went  south  to  the  English  Lakes,  and  stayed  at  a  good  old- 


JOURNEY   TO   EUROPE   IN    1 852.  3O9 

fashioned  hotel  near  the  railway  station  called  Birthwaite,  where 
we  had  the  best  fried  eggs  and  bacon  I  ever  tasted — strange  asso- 
ciation with  the  beautiful  scenery  of  the  Lakes.  Bessie  and  I  took  a 
walk  past  Rydal  Mount,  where  Wordsworth  lived,  and  also  passed 
the  place  where  John  Wilson,  for  so  many  years  editor  of  Black- 
zvood's  Magazine  under  the  nom  de  plu?ne  of  "  Christopher  North," 
was  living. 

At  the  Glasgow  business  meeting  I  forgot  to  say  that  it  was 
decided  that  Tom  Sellar  should  remain  at  Liverpool  to  manage 
our  house  there  (Alexander  Dennistoun  &  Co.),  which  I  had  man- 
aged from  1832  till  1844,  greatly  to  the  wrath  of  his  young  American 
wife. 

From  the  Lakes,  where  we  stayed  five  days  at  the  Windermere 
Hotel,  we  returned  to  Liverpool  and  went  to  Radley's  Hotel  until 
the  day  we  sailed  for  New  York  per  steamer  Europa. 


CHAPTER  XX. 

ANOTHER    TRIP     TO     ENGLAND — I     PLACE     MOST     OF     MY     CHILDREN 
BY    MY    FIRST    WIFE    AT    BOARDING  SCHOOLS  IN  VARIOUS  PLACES. 

On  October  9,  1852,  we  reached  New  York.  Tom  Kane  had 
welcoming  gifts  for  each  of  us  on  our  arrival  at  5  West  Sixteenth 
Street,  two  framed  engravings  of  Ary  Scheffer's  "•  Mignon  "  for 
Bessie,  to  whom  he  was  engaged,  and  the  large  Arctic  picture  by- 
Hamilton  for  me,  and  a  silver  epergne  for  Margaret,  all  showing 
what  a  generous,  kind-hearted  fellow  he  was. 

As  soon  as  I  had  got  settled,  B.  F.  Dawson,  having  applied  for 
and  obtained  leave  of  absence  for  a  year,  on  account  of  his 
health,  began  making  preparations  for  his  departure  for  Europe 
with  his  wife  and  children.  He  was  to  have  no  salary  during  his 
year's  absence,  but  if  he  returned  before  the  end  of  the  year  his 
salary  was  to  recommence  from  the  date  of  his  return  to  the  office. 
They  sailed  from  New  York  for  Havre  in  the  Humboldt  steamer  on 
November  20,  1852,  and  arrived  back  in  New  York  on  October 
5.  1853.  During  his  absence  I  had  J.  Walter  as  my  partner,  and 
Robert  Winthrop  and  Robert  Barrett  as  my  most  efficient  and  trust- 
worthy clerks,  so  that  I  wasn't  much  to  be  pitied  for  his  absence. 

When  at  Rome,  Dawson  had  a  private  interview  with  the  Pope 
of  that  day,  and  he  and  "his  Holiness  "  had  quite  a  pleasant  con- 
versation together,  and  he  had  all  his  children  blessed  by  the  Pope, 
which,  if  it  didn't  do  them  much  good,  probably  did  them  as  little 
harm.  He  (Dawson)  brought  me  back  as  a  present  the  marble 
"  Proserpine  "  now  in  the  front  parlor.  If  he  and  his  wife  and 
children  had  all  been  lost,  he  had  left  me  all  his  very  handsome 
silver  spoons,  which  he  had  had  made  out  of  a  bequest  from 
an  old  bachelor  friend  of  his,  Robert  Dixon,  but  of  course  as  they 
all  came  back  well  and  hearty,  the  silver  plate  descended  to  his 
children,  but  his  intentions  Avere  kindly  "in  case  of  accidents." 

On  Friday,  January  28,  1853,  at  5  West  Sixteenth  Street,  Henry 
Duncan  was  born  at  7  a.  m. — a  fine  but  tender  and  delicate  little  boy. 


ANOTHER   TRIP   TO    ENGLAND.  3II 

Meanwhile,  leaving  him  to  be  nursed  and  taken  care  of,  let  me 
insert  here  some  information  which  I  obtained  from  JohnWalter  rela- 
tive to  occurrences  in  1850,  1851,  and  1852,  which  I  had  forgotten  all 
about,  and  which  my  daughter  Bessie,  after  reading  the  foregoing, 
when  she  was  here  on  a  short  visit  last  week  (June  2  and  3,  1892), 
recalled  in  part  to  my  memory.  She  said  Charlotte  had  accompanied 
John  Walter  to  Europe  in  185 1.  I  felt  sure  she  was  wrong  in  this, 
and  that  his  college  friend  JohnDe  Ruyter  alone  accompanied  him  in 
185 1,  but  in  order  to  be  sure  I  Avrote  to  John  Walter,  asking  him  to 
give  me  his  reminiscences  as  to  1850,  1851,  and  1852,  and  in  response 
he  sent  me  a  letter  dated  June  3,  1892,  which  I  now  copy  into  and 
make  part  of  this  dreadfully  voluminous  autobiography  : 

"  South  Orange,  N.  J.,  June  3,  1892. 
"  My  Dear  Father: 

"  John  De  Ruyter  and  I  were  at  sea  on  the  steamer  Atlantic  August 
7,  185 1,,  under  command  of  Captain  West  of  the  Collins  Line 
bound  from  New  York  to  Liverpool.  Charlotte  sailed  some  time 
before  on  an  Anchor  Line  steamer  called  the  Edinburgh  [I  think  J.  W. 
W.  is  mistaken  about  this  name],  and  had  at  that  time  been  in  Scot- 
land chiefly  for  I  think  about  a  year  \i.  e.,  from  1850]. 

"August  17,  185 1,  I  was  at  St.  Michael's  Mount  near  Liverpool 
[Wm.  Cross'  then  residence],  and  on  August  26,  1851,  at  Elie, 
whither  I  had  escorted  '  Zibby  '  Cross  [his  cousin]  from  Edinburgh, 
and  didn't  we  have  a  fine  time  ! 

"  August  29,  185 1.  At  Dunkeld,  then  Oban,  on  a  visit  to  old  Mr. 
Sellar  at  Ardtornish,  then  with  James  Campbell  on  an  excursion  to 
lona  and  Staffa. 

"Early  in  September,  1851,  De  Ruyter  and  I  sailed  from 
London  for  Ostend,  and  traveled  through  Belgium,  Holland, 
Switzerland,  and  Bavaria,  striking  the  Danube  at  Linz  [in  those  times 
a  day's  steaming  above  Vienna],  from  Vienna  by  steamer  to  Buda- 
Pesth  ;  and  Galatz,  which  last  we  reached  on  October  31,  1851, 
and  remained  over  Sunday,  November  i  ;  on  November  3,  185 1, 
we  were  on  the  Black  Sea  near  Varna,  and  on  November  4  arrived 
at  Constantinople. 

"  On  November  16,  1851,  we  were  in  the  French  steamer  Alexandre 
off  the  mouth  of  the   Dardanelles,  and  on  the  17th  off  Tenedos,  on 


312  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

November  i8  at  Smyrna,  and  on  November  19  off  Syra,  with  clothes 
all  wet  from  heavy  seas  washing  down  the  cabin  (second  class)  during 
the  night.  On  November  20  off  Cape  Matapan,  very  rough  weather; 
on  November  24  at  Malta  ;  from  thence  on  November  28  by  Sper- 
oneca  to  Syracuse,  and  thence  on  foot  to  Messina. 

"  On  December  5,  185 1,  at  Naples,  December  20  at  Rome,  thence 
to  Florence  and  Venice,  at  which  last  place  as  De  Ruyter  and  I  were 
eating  ices  in  front  of  a  restaurant  in  Piazza  San  Marco,  we  were 
arrested  by  a  squad  of  Austrian  soldiers,  and  locked  up  for  the  night 
for  no  cause  assigned.  We  could  not  understand  their  bad  German  and 
Italian,  except  so  very  little  as  to  make  them  think  we  were  sham- 
ming ignorance.  Early  next  morning  their  officer,  having  returned 
from  a  ball,  said  we  had  been  arrested  for  wearing  slouch  hats,  mine 
being  especially  odious,  as  being  brown  in  color,  the  Hungarian 
revolutionary  badge.  /  had  an  English  passport  signed  by  Palm- 
erston,  who  had  snubbed  the  Austrians,  and  De  Ruyter's  Amer- 
ican document  was  malodorous  on  account  of  the  then  recent  Martin 
Coszta  affair. 

"  We  were  escorted  to  our  hotel  by  a  file  of  soldiers,  and  ordered 
to  wear  stove-pipe  hats  or  leave  the  country.  We  did  the  last,  by 
Genoa,  Marseilles,  Bordeaux,  and  Paris.  I  reached  Liverpool  in 
February,  1852. 

"On  May  26,  1852,  I  was  at  Lagarie,  in  consequence  of  orders 
from  you  to  hunt  up  Charlotte,  take  her  a  small  jaunt,  and  bring  her 
home  to  America. 

"We  were  at  Elie  that  month  also,  and  I  took  her  to  Penzance, 
where  on  a  Saturday  afternoon,  the  miners  having  all  come  up,  I 
descended  alone  into  the  BotoUock  Mine,  then  the  deepest  in  the 
world,  and  famous  for  having  the  sea,  which  had  broken  through 
its  roof,  kept  out  by  a  structure  of  boards  and  timber  like  the  deck  of 
a  ship.  I  went  down  till  I  was  fairly  tired,  and  desperately  lonesome. 
Coming  up  was  much  worse  than  going  down,  and  it  seemed  as 
if  I  never  should  see  daylight  again  ;  at  last,  exhausted  and  scared, 
I  got  out,  and  have  never  hankered  much  after  mines  since. 

"  On  May  30,  1852,  Charlotte  and  I  were  at  sea  in  the  steamer 
America,  en  route  for  Halifax,  N.  S.,  where  we  spent  about  four  hours, 
and  were  immensely  conceited  at  our  nautical  superiority  to  the  un- 
fortunate '  Blue  Noses  '  who  there  joined  us  on  the  way  to  Boston. 


ANOTHER   TRIP    TO    ENGLAND.  313 

"  My  piety  seems  to  have  given  out  here,  for  I  cari  find  no  more 
dates  in  my  old  Bible  for  some  years. 

"  Your  loving  son, 
(Signed)  "  J,  Walter  Wood." 

In  the  summer  of  1852,  when  Margaret,  Bessie,  and  I  were  in 
Europe,  Charlotte,  Harriet,  Willie,  and  little  Helen  went  to  Glen 
Cove,  L.  I.,  Charlotte  and  John  Walter  being  in  charge  of  the  three 
younger,  and  he  going  down  to  New  York  every  day,  where,  with 
Dawson,  he  took  charge  of  Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co.  I  think  my 
old  friend  Richard  O'Gorman  was  at  Glen  Cove  that  summer,  and 
the  young  people  had  quite  a  pleasant  time  of  it. 

Having  thus  detailed  various  matters  which  occurred  in  1850, 
1851,  and  1852,  and  which  I  had  forgotten  until  John  Walter's  letter, 
quoted  above,  put  me  in  mind  of  them,  I  now  return  to  1853,  in  which 
year,  on  January  28,  my  little  Henry  Duncan  was  born.  The  next 
family  event  of  importance  that  year  was  the  marriage  of  my  dear 
Bessie  to  my  friend  and  her  second  cousin  Thomas  L.  Kane,  second 
son  of  Judge  Kane  and  brother  of  Dr.  Kane,  surgeon  United  States 
Navy,  the  Arctic  explorer.  It  took  place  on  April  21,  at  University 
Place  and  Tenth  Street  Presbyterian  Church,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Potts 
officiating.  After  the  wedding  the  families  of  Kane  and  Wood 
returned  to  my  house,  5  West  Sixteenth  Street,  Dr.  Potts  was  pres- 
ent, and,  as  I  was  a  very  busy  man  in  those  days,  and  could  ill  spare 
the  time  from  Wall  Street  for  weddings  or  any  other  ceremonies,  I 
thought  it  would  be  a  good  plan  to  "  kill  two  birds  with  one  stone," 
and  so  I  asked  Dr.  Potts  to  baptize  little  Henry  Duncan.  I  think 
Dr.  Potts  rather  hesitated,  but  finally  assented,  and  my  small  son 
was  named  after  my  esteemed  friend  and  preceptor  Dr.  Henry  Dun- 
can, the  original  inventor  of  savings  banks,  minister  of  the  parish  of 
Ruthwell  in  Dumfriesshire,  in  whose  manse  I  lived  for  eighteen 
months  (1823  and  1824).  He  was  at  one  time  moderator  of  the  Gen- 
eral Assembly  of  the  Kirk  of  Scotland,  had  the  most  beautiful  manse 
and  grounds  in  Scotland,  and  at  the  disruption  in  1843  he  left  the 
whole.  His  sons  George  and  Wallace  also  left  their  livings,  and 
his  son-in-law,  whose  name  I  forget,  left  his. 

The  summer  of  1853  we  spent  at  New  Rochelle,  in  an  old- 
fashioned  and  handsome  house  turned  into   a  boarding  house.     I 


314  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

went  into  town  daily,  and  on  one  of  these  days  I  heard,  to  my  great 
disgust,  that  Robert  Schuyler,  president  of  the  New  York  and  New 
Haven  Railroad,  a  man  of  high  standing,  had  been  issuing  fraudu- 
lent certificates  of  stock.  I  had  advanced  money  to  (Richard)  Dick 
Schell  on  a  lot  of  these.  He  had  offered  me  bonds  of  some  West- 
ern railways,  but  I  said  I  would  not  take  these,  but  would  lend  him 
the  money  on  stocks  or  bonds  nearer  home,  and  he  brought  me  New 
York  and  New  Haven  stock.  When  I  ascertained  how  much  of  the 
spurious  stock  I  had  taken,  I  set  to  to  find  out  the  law  of  the  case. 
Everything  was  in  order,  except  that  the  issue  of  the  stock  was  not 
authorized  by  the  directors.  In  my  researches  I  unfortunately 
found  that  the  Bank  of  Ireland  at  one  time  had  issued  certain  drafts 
on  the  Bank  of  England.  These  were  complete  in  every  way,  except 
that  the  legal  seal  had  been  stolen  by  the  secretary  and  affixed  to  the 
drafts  without  the  knowledge  of  the  directors  of  the  Bank  of  Ire- 
land. It  was  held  by  the  courts  that  the  Bank  of  Ireland  was  not 
liable.  This  seemed  to  be  a  very  similar  case  to  that  of  Robert 
Schuyler  and  the  New  York  and  New  Haven  Railroad  Co.,  and 
therefore  when  my  friend  Wilson  G.  Hunt,  one  of  the  directors  of 
the  New  York  and  New  Haven  Railroad  Co.,  came  and  offered  me 
one  good  share  for  two  of  my  spurious  ones,  after  due  consideration, 
and  bearing  in  mind  the  Bank  of  Ireland  case,  I  accepted  the  offer. 
Some  other  people  who  had  been  similarly  swindled  followed  my 
example,  but  after  some  time  had  elapsed  the  American  courts 
decided  that  the  New  York  and  New  Haven  Railroad  Co.  was  liable  for 
the  fraudulent  acts  of  its  president,  and  those  who  held  the  spurious 
scrip  eventually  got  genuine  scrip  for  it.  So  sometimes  it  would 
appear  that  it  is  better  and  safer  not  to  know  too  much.  I  don't 
know  whether  or  not  the  American  courts  were  cognizant  of  the 
decision  of  the  Irish  court.  I  think  I  found  my  information  in  a 
"  History  of  the  Bank  of  England,"  by  John  Francis,  but  cannot  lay 
my  hand  upon  it,  but  in  Francis'  "  History  of  the  Bank  of  England  " 
there  is  a  somewhat  similar  case  detailed  (pp.  126-133,  "^o^-  ii-)' 
I  suspect  I  must  have  got  my  information  about  the  Bank  of  Ire- 
land's spurious  bills  somewhere  else  than  in  Francis'  "  History  of 
the  Bank  of  England."  There  never  had  been  any  case  like  that  of 
the  Robert  Schuyler  fraud  in  the  New  York  courts,  so  when  the  New 
Haven  Railroad  Co.  offered  to  the  holders  of  the  spurious  bonds, 


ANOTHER   TRIP   TO   ENGLAND.  315 

before  the  case  was  fairly  taken  into  court,  to  give  them  one  good 
bond  for  every  two  spurious  ones,  looking  at  the  two  cases  above 
referred  to,  I  thought  discretion  the  better  part  of  valor,  and  accepted 
the  proposition,  and  the  holders  who  did  not  accept  it,  but  went  into 
court,  were  beaten  as  to  the  validity  of  their  bonds,  but  the  court 
held  that  the  New  Haven  Railroad  Co.  had  obtained  money  on  false 
pretenses,  /.  e.,  the  spurious  bonds,  and  found  the  railroad  company 
liable  for  the  money  advanced  to  them  on  the  bonds,  and  so  these 
holders  got  paid  in  full. 

This  summer  of  1853  our  firm  also  had  a  curious  case  with  the 
Buffalo  and  New  York  Railroad  Co.,  subsequently  a  portion  of  the 
Erie  Railroad.  The  president,  Mr.  Patchin,  was  very  deaf  when  he 
did  not  choose  to  hear  ;  the  treasurer  was  a  Mr.  Fearing.  As 
security  for  our  advances  to  the  railroad,  and  in  addition  to  its  bonds, 
we  held  the  notes  of  the  president  indorsed  by  the  treasurer  in  their 
individual  capacity,  and  in  order  to  realize  on  our  assets  we  got  our 
lawyers,  Foster  &  Thomson,  to  attach  all  the  rolling  stock  of  the 
Buffalo  and  New  York  Railroad  Co.;  and,  to  do  this,  Mr.  James 
Thomson  one  fine  morning  started  with  the  necessary  papers  and 
sheriff's  assistants  and  attached  all  the  assets  of  the  railroad  between 
New  York  and  Buffalo.  This  haul  recouped  us,  and  so  set  the 
treasurer  and  president  free  from  their  personal  liabilities.  Ex- 
cepting the  Dick  Schell  and  New  York  and  New  Haven  incident 
above  narrated,  I  have  no  very  distinct  recollection  of  the  last  of  the 
year  1853. 

In  1854  matters,  as  far  as  I  recollect,  went  on  in  a  sort  of  prosper- 
ous jog-trot.  In  the  summer  of  1854  Margaret,  the  children,  and  I 
went  to  Morristown,  N.  J.,  boarding  at  the  house  of  a  Miss  Mann. 
Miss  Ann  Slidell,  sister  of  John  and  Tom  Slidell,  lived  there.  I 
went  to  and  from  New  York  every  day,  and  a  weary  long  job  it  was. 
I  used  to  rise  about  4  a.  m.,  get  breakfast,  and  then  start  by  railway 
for  Newark  ;  when  we  reached  that  town,  we  went  across  it  in  a  sur- 
face railway,  and  then  got  into  another  railroad,  which  took  us,  I 
think,  to  Jersey  City,  and  thence  by  ferryboat  to  New  York.  In  the 
afternoon  I  reversed  the  process,  and  got  to  Morristown  for  a 
"  high  tea." 

In  1855  for  the  first  six  months  things  went  on  as  usual,  but  early 
in  summer  I  found  it  necessary  to  go  to  England,  and  as  Margaret 


3l6  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF     WILLIAM    WOOD. 

was  not  in  a  condition  for  traveling,  I  judged  it  prudent  to  leave  her 
at  home  with  Dennistoun  and  little  Duncan,  while  I  took  with  me 
to  Europe  J.  Walter,  Charlotte,  Willie,  Harriet,  and  little  Helen. 
We  left  this  in  the  end  of  May  in  the  steamer  Baltic,  Captain  Com- 
stock,  of  the  American  or  Collins  Line.  I  paid  $585  for  the  whole 
of  our  passages.  We  had  two  staterooms,  Willie  and  I  in  one,  and 
Charlotte,  Harriet,  and  little  Helen  in  the  other.  The  full  passages 
were  $130  each,  and  Helen's  $65.  We  went  to  the  Adelphi  Hotel, 
Liverpool  (Radley's)  ;  and  before  leaving  Liverpool  I  took,  on 
June  12,  two  staterooms  for  the  return  of  little  Helen  and  myself  on 
board  the  Collins  steamer  Atlantic,  Captain  BriggSj  from  Liverpool 
for  New  York  on  August  25,  1855. 

Will  Cross  and  my  sister  Anna  and  their  daughter  Elizabeth 
were  on  a  visit  to  my  sister  Mrs.  Ferguson  at  Clifton  near  Bristol, 
and  Tom  Sellar  appears  to  have  been  temporarily  in  charge  of  our 
Liverpool  house,  Alexander  Dennistoun  &  Co.,  during  Cross'  ab- 
sence. T.  Sellar  and  his  wife  were  living  at  Woolton  Hill  near 
Liverpool,  opposite  the  windmill. 

We  went  from  Liverpool  to  Clifton,  and  enjoyed  ourselves  there. 
I  consulted  Dr.  Symonds  about  myself  and  Willie.  He  speedily 
disposed  of  my  case  by  saying  there  was  nothing  the  matter  with 
me,  and  that  certain  symptoms  which  I  had  originated  from 
nothing  but  sitting  in  a  newly  painted  room  in  our  ofifice  in  New 
York. 

From  Clifton  Charlotte,  Harriet,  Willie,  Helen,  and  I  went  to 
London  by  way  of  Oxford,  where  I  think  we  put  up  at  the  Angel 
Hotel,  and  had  letters  to  Lancaster  of  Balliol,  I  think,  and  to 
William  Douglas  of  Exeter  College,  a  son  of  Sir  James  Douglas, 
who,  with  his  daughter,  were  long  and  intimate  friends  of  my  sister 
Mary  Ferguson.  On  our  way  we  passed  through  the  town  or  village 
of  Wickwar,  and  on  my  making  a  remark  on  the  oddity  of  the  name, 
Willie  said  he  had  often  heard  of  \\\t  flame  of  war,  so  it  was  natural 
that  it  should  have  a  wick.  We  went  from  Oxford  to  London, 
where  I  think  we  put  up  at  the  St.  James  Hotel,  Jermyn  Street. 
The  children  went  to  the  Tower,  and  saw  all  the  other  sights. 

From  London  we  went  north  by  the  East  Coast  Railway,  and  for 
some  reason  stopped  over  one  night  at  a  nice  new  hotel  at  Crewe. 
When  Fox  was  returned  M.  P.  for  AVestminster,  there  was  a  great 


ANOTHER   TRIP   TO   ENGLAND.  317 

dinner  at  the  house  of  Mr.  Crewe,  a  leading  Whig  ;  the  Prince  Regent 
was  present  and  gave  the  toast  : 

"  True  blue  and  Mrs.  Crewe," 

to  which  she  at  once  rejoined  : 

"  True  blue,  and  all  of  you," 

bhie  and  buff  or  yellow  being  the  Whig  colors. 

We  then  proceeded  on  to  Edinburgh,  passing  behind  the  Bass 
Rock  and  in  front  of  North  Berwick  Law,  opposite  Elie,  from 
which  place  from  early  boyhood  I  had  seen  these  conspicuous 
objects,  but  never  had  been  on  the  same  side  of  the  Firth  of  Forth 
(south  side)  until  now. 

From  Edinburgh  we  went  to  visit  my  aunt  Helen  Wood,  my 
father's  youngest  sister,  and  had  the  pleasure  of  introducing  to 
her  my  youngest  daughter,  Helen,  her  namesake.  The  dear  old 
lady  thought  her  "  a  pert  wee  hussy."  At  Elie,  on  July  24,  I  heard 
of  the  birth  on  July  10  of  my  first  grandchild,  Harriet  Amelia 
Kane,  at  Fern  Rock  near  Philadelphia,  the  then  residence  of  her 
paternal  grandfather.  Judge  John  K.  Kane.  On  our  way  to  Elie 
we  went  through  St.  Andrews,  and  took  my  uncle  John's  son, 
James  Dennistoun,  with  us  to  Elie.  (He  died  young.)  This  was 
my  last  visit  to  the  dear  old  house  at  Elie.  We  returned  to  Edin- 
burgh, and  from  thence  to  Glasgow,  and  then  went  to  pay  my  uncle 
Alexander  Dennistoun  a  visit  at  his  beautiful  place  Lagarie,  on 
the  Gareloch.  The  house  was  built  and  the  grounds  laid  out  by 
his  sister  Mary  Dennistoun,  the  widow  of  my  father's  youngest 
brother,  Walter  Wood.  We  had  a  delightful  visit.  Uncle  Alick 
was  so  delighted  with  little  Helen's  singing,  and  her  bright,  cheerful 
ways,  that  he  wanted  to  adopt  her,  but  I  would  not  consent  ;  for  her 
own  sake  and  happiness  it  looks  now  (1892)  that  I  made  a  very 
great  mistake,  but  I  did  it  for  the  best. 

My  uncle  Alick  had  a  fine  yacht,  delightfully  fitted  up,  and  with 
all  sorts  of  luxuries  of  meat  and  drink,  and  a  good  cook.  Yacht 
owners  had  some  privileges  in  getting  their  wines  duty  free. 

One  fine  morning  the  captain  of  the  yacht  came  up  to  Lagarie  in 
uniform,  with  his  cap  and  gold-lace  band  round  it.  Uncle  Alick 
told  him  to   get   ready  the  yacht  for  a  sail  down  to  the  island   of 


3l8  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Arran  and  back.  He  then  said  to  me  :  "  Now,  William,  you  come 
with  us,  and  just  lay  aside  your  desire  to  hurry  to  the  end  of  your 
voyage,  and  enjoy  the  voyage  itself."  I  said  I  had  quite  enough 
of  the  sea  crossing  the  Atlantic.  However,  he  overpersuaded  me 
to  go,  and  I  went.  After  we  had  fairly  started  I  took  John  Dennis- 
toun  apart  on  the  deck,  and  said  to  him  that  I  was  not  satisfied 
with  the  way  in  which  the  Borough  Bank  of  Liverpool  was  con- 
ducted, and  that  I  was  going  to  sell  my  shares,  and  I  advised  him 
to  sell  his  ;  but,  said  I,  Uncle  Alick  has  a  good  opinion  of  the  bank, 
and  perhaps  he  would  like  to  buy  our  shares.  So  we  went  to 
where  Uncle  Alick  was  sitting  and  made  the  proposition  to  him.  He 
replied  that,  while  he  thought  well  of  the  bank,  he  also  thought 
that  he  held  enough  of  the  shares  already  and  didn't  want  any 
more.  So  I  still  advised  John  to  sell  out,  but  he  was  very  loyal  to 
his  brother,  and  would  not,  saying  to  me  :  "  If  it  were  known  that 
I  was  selling  out,  people  would  think  that  there  was  something 
wrong,  and  that  would  lessen  the  value  of  Alick's  shares."  "  Well," 
said  I,  "  I  am  determined  to  sell  out  my  shares,  but  I  will  do  it  in 
such  a  way  that  it  will  do  no  harm  to  anyone.  It  is  now  July,  1855, 
and  I  will  leave  orders  with  Will  Cross  and  Tom  Sellar  to  sell  out 
my  shares  gradually  between  now  and  December  31,  1856,  but 
before  that  time  every  share  must  be  sold,  without  regard  to  the 
price."  Well,  after  I  left  for  New  York,  they  began  selling  at  ;^ii 
per  share, — they  cost  me  jQio, — and  had  realized  about  one-half  of 
my  1000  shares,  when,  at  the  very  end  of  December,  1856,  they  sold 
the  balance  at  or  about  the  same  price — Will  Cross,  when  advising 
me  of  the  sale  of  the  last  batch,  writing  to  me  that  I  had  made  a 
great  mistake  in  selling  out,  and  that  if  I  had  held  on  I  would 
eventually  have  got  ^^15  per  share.  In  the  following  October, 
1857,  they  were  not  only  not  worth  par,  or  ;£io,  but  were  worth  less 
than  nothing.     But  that  is  anticipating  matters. 

From  Lagarie  we  went  to  Harrogate,  where  Anna  and  her  children 
were  spending  some  weeks,  and  were  there  on  August  6,  1855,  leav- 
ing on  the  8th  to  return  to  London.  In  London  we  all  visited 
the  Crystal  Palace,  Hampton  Court,  and  the  Vernon  Gallery,  and 
after  a  week  in  London  we  went  to  Bristol,  and  then  to  the  Baths 
Hotel,  Clifton.  I  left  Charlotte  with  her  aunt  Mary  Ferguson,  my 
sweet  sister.     Willie's  health  had  become  very  infirm,  and  I  left  him 


I   PLACE   MY   CHILDREN   AT   BOARDING   SCHOOLS.        319 

to  board  with  a  friend  of  Mary's,  Dr.  W.  Mitchell  Clark,  who  would 
see  that  he  did  not  study  too  much  or  too  little.  August  19  I 
returned  with  Helen  to  Liverpool.  I  had  placed  my  daughter  Har- 
riet at  Miss  Thornley's  boarding  school  near  Liverpool.  Miss 
Thornley  had  been  governess  to  my  sister  Anna  Cross'  children, 
and  had  recently  opened  a  school  of  her  own.  Harriet  at  this  time 
wore  her  hair  in  long  glossy  ringlets,  and  was  a  very  pretty  girl. 

Helen  and  I  stayed  at  St.  Michael's  Mount  for  a  few  days,  although 
Anna  Cross  and  the  children  were  still  at  Harrogate.  The 
house  was  in  confusion,  as  the  family  were  just  about  to  remove  to 
Champion  Hill,  London.  Cross  was  going  to  take  charge  of  our 
new  London  branch,  Dennistoun,  Cross  &  Co.  Cross  gave  a  din- 
ner at  which  little  Helen,  though  a  child,  presided.  Cross,  Uncle 
Alick,  John  Dennistoun,  Alexander  McGregor,  and  Matt  Hayes 
were  there,  and  it  was  the  last  time  I  ever  saw  any  of  them  except 
John  D.  He  came  to  visit  us  in  America  in  1858.  I  never  saw 
Anna  or  Mary  again  either. 

On  August  25  Helen  and  I  embarked  for  New  York  on  board  the 
Atla7itic  steamer  of  the  Collins  Line,  Captain  Briggs.  We  had  on 
board  Senator  Toombs  of  Georgia  and  his  daughter  Sally  ;  also 
William  E,  Dodge  and  Mrs.  Dodge.  Helen  struck  up  a  great 
friendship  with  Sally  Toombs,  which  I  recollect  Mrs.  Dodge  telling 
me  she  did  not  at  all  approve  of.  The  senator  and  I  got  on  very 
well  together,  as  he  was  a  Free  Trader.  He  afterward  was  a  leader 
in  the  rebellion,  and  said  he  would  yet  call  the  roll  of  his  slaves  at 
Bunker  Hill,  in  which  he  fortunately  found  himself  vastly  mis- 
taken. Another  bond  of  friendliness  between  Toombs  and  myself 
was  that  I  had  with  me  a  long  letter  of  Thomas  Jefferson  to  Mr. 
I^eiper,  Tom  Kane's  mother's  father,  which  Tom  had  lent  me, 
and  I  returned  to  him  when  I  got  home.  If  I  remember  rightly, 
Jefferson  expressed  regret  in  it  that  he  had  ever  left  his  chemical 
experiments  at  Monticello  and  gone  into  politics  ! 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

THE    DISASTROUS     YEAR    1857. 

I  don't  recollect  when  we  arrived  in  New  York,  but  probably 
about  September  6.  I  made  up  my  mind  to  send  Helen  to  Miss 
Haines'  boarding  school,  as  it  was  dull  for  her  at  home,  Harriet 
being  in  England.  I  used  to  go  for  her  every  Saturday  to  fetch  her 
home  for  that  day  and  Sunday,  and  very  glad  the  little  woman  was 
to  see  me,  and  I  her.  I  recollect  when  we  arrived  from  Liverpool 
Duncan  came  to  the  door  to  meet  us,  a  sweet,  delicate  little  fellow 
in  summer  jacket  and  trousers,  then,  and  for  some  years  afterward 
so  thin  and  delicate  that  we  used  to  call  him  "  chicken-legs."  No 
one  could  then  have  imagined  that  he  would  have  grown  to  be  the 
tall,  broad,  handsome  man  he  has  since  become. 

Things  went  on  at  5  West  Sixteenth  Street  pretty  much  in  the 
usual  way  up  to  the  end  of  1855.  On  January  30,  1856,  little 
"  Chalmers  "  was  born,  the  handsomest  baby,  in  my  opinion,  that  I 
ever  had.  I  intended  to  call  him  Patrick  Chalmers,  after  my  paternal 
great-grandfather,  and  his  mother  had  consented  to  it,  and  a  silver 
cup  from  Cousin  Carrie  Neilson,  with  that  name  inscribed  on  it,  had 
come  for  the  baby.  But  his  mother  got  into  her  head,  or  had  it  put 
into  her  head,  that  "  Patrick  "  was  a  very  common  Irish  name.  I 
assured  her  that  in  Scotland  it  was  a  very  rare  name,  and  rather 
aristocratic,  but  she  would  none  of  it. 

"  And  when  a  woman  wills  she  will,  you  may  depend  on't, 
And  if  she  won't  she  won't,  and  there's  an  end  on't." 

I  see  by  my  memorandum  book  that  on  February  1-2,  1856,  I 
wrote  to  Charlotte,  Harriet,  Aunt  Helen,  Anna  Cross,  John  Dennis- 
toun,  and  Tom  Sellar  announcing  per  Baltic  the  birth  of  "  P.  C. 
W.,"  /.  <?.,  Patrick  Chalmers  Wood,  so  the  dropping  of  the  "  Patrick  " 
had  not  taken  place  at  that  date. 

On  February  26,  1856,  I  wrote  to  Willie,  Harriet,  Aunt  Helen, 
John    Dennistoun,    Mary   Ferguson,    and   Tom    Sellar    announcing 


THE   DISASTROUS   YEAR    1857.  32I 

John  Walter's  engagement  to  Sabina  Redmond,  eldest  daughter  of 
my  old  friend  and  correspondent  at  Charleston,  William  Redmond. 
I  seem  to  have  written  frequent  letters  to  Charlotte,  Harriet,  and 
Willie. 

On  April  2,  1856,  I  wrote  to  Archie  Lawrie  under  cover  to  Dr. 
Lawrie,  his  father,  I  presume,  thanking  him  for  his  genealogy  of  the 
Finlays  which  he  made  out  for  me,  and  it  is  pasted  into  my 
H.  A.  W.  Book. 

In  the  summer  of  1856  I  took  for  summer  quarters  a  house  in 
Locust  Hill  Avenue,  Yonkers,  near  Mr.  and  Mrs.  William  Bell,  the 
latter  of  whom  has  been  an  intimate  friend  ever  since  up  till  this 
date  (October  29,  1892).  During  the  summer  our  kinsman,  Dr. 
Elisha  Kent  Kane,  the  Arctic  explorer,  and  surgeon  in  the  United 
States  Navy,  paid  us  a  visit,  and  went  from  us  to  London,  when  I 
gave  him  a  letter  of  introduction  to  my  brother-in-law  William 
Cross,  Champion  Hill,  and  of  Dennistoun,  Cross  &  Co.;  from  Lon- 
don he  went  to  Cuba,  where  he  died. 

On  July  7  I  see  that  I  wrote  to  Miss  Haines  asking  her  to  keep  a 
place  for  Nellie  as  a  boarder  next  session. 

On  September  24  of  this  year  my  eldest  son,  John  Walter,  was 
married  to  Sabina  Redmond,  eldest  daughter  of  my  old  friend 
William  Redmond.  They  were  married  at  his  house,  Hillside,  South 
Orange,  N.  J.,  and  ever  since  she  has  been  much  more  like  a 
daughter  to  me  than  a  daughter-in-law.  In  my  notebook  for  1855- 
58  I  see  that  my  marriage  present  to  John  Walter  was  $2573,  all 
silverware. 

In  December  of  this  year  I  seem  to  have  met  Commodore  Perry 
at  dinner  at  Mr.  De  Peyster's,  and  more  than  once.  He  wanted 
a  draughtsman  to  go  with  him  to  Japan,  and  offered  $400  per 
annum,  with  officer's  rations,  for  such  a  person.  My  friend 
Dr.  Hunter,  then  a  very  young  man,  fresh  from  the  north  of  Ire- 
land, applied  for  the  place,  but  asked  $500  per  annum,  although 
he  has  told  me  since  that  if  Commodore  Perry  had  offered 
$450  he  would  have  taken  it.  Fortunately  he  did  not,  and  Thomas 
Hunter  went  into  the  school  system  as  an  assistant  in  Grammar 
School  35,  West  Thirteenth  Street.  He  rapidly  rose  and  eventually 
became  principal.  He  originated  the  first  Evening  High  School, 
which  was  held  for  many  years  in  the  building  of  Grammar  School 


322  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

35,  and  he  eventually  became  president  of  the  Normal  College 
in  1870. 

I  seem  to  have  carried  on  a  large  private  correspondence  with  my 
children  on  this  and  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic  (Charlotte  and 
Willie),  and  with  many  friends,  besides  attending  to  my  large  and 
growing  business. 

I  now  enter  upon  the  year  1857,  a  very  memorable  year  to  me  and 
mine,  beginning  with  great  prosperity,  and  ending  most  disastrously, 
and  all  owing  to  our  unfortunate  connection  with  the  Borough  Bank 
of  Liverpool,  mainly  owing  to  my  uncle  Alick's  desire  to  be  as  great 
a  banker  in  Liverpool  as  he  was  in  Glasgow.  Against  his  investment 
in  that  concern  I  strongly  warned  him  in  1846.  I  myself  got  out 
of  it  with  about  six  hundred  pounds  gain  on  December  31,  1856. 

In  the  spring  of  1857  I  went  up  to  Tarry  town  and  engaged  a 
house  there  for  the  summer  season.  It  commanded  a  fine  view  of  the 
North  River  from  the  back  windows,  at  that  season,  when  the  trees 
were  not  in  leaf.  But  when  they  became  so  in  summer,  we  could 
not  see  the  Hudson,  as  I  might  have  foreseen  had  I  not  been  too 
much  occupied  with  our  then  profitable  business.  My  uncle,  John 
Dennistoun,  estimated  that  the  business  would  give  us  a  gain  of 
;;^85,ioo  sterling.     His  items  were  as  follows  : 

Australia ...........  ;^22,000 

London, 16,800 

New  Orleans, 11,800 

Glasgow,      ..........  10,000 

Liverpool,         ..........  5, 000 

New  York, 20,500 

;^86,IOO 

Notwithstanding  this  prosperous  outlook  in  the  first  six  or  eight 
months  of  1857,  I  recollect  very  well  that  in  traveling  daily  between 
Tarrytown  and  New  York,  my  spirits  were  depressed,  and  I  could  not 
help  feeling  that  there  was  some  heavy  calamity  impending.  We  had  a 
large  and  fine  garden  at  Tarrytown,  kept  a  cow,  and  had  two  men  serv- 
ants. I  never  had  but  one  before,  and  never  but  one  since.  There  was 
everything  about  us  to  make  me  cheerful  except  the  want  of  view 
from  the  house.  The  place  was  probably  malarious.  My  depression 
of  spirits  might  have  in  part  arisen  from  its  being  the  year  of   the 


THE   DISASTROUS   YEAR    1857.  323 

East  Indian  mutiny,  with  the  reports  of  the  shocking  and  cruel 
murders  committed  by  the  Hindoos.  I  presume  that  it  was  this 
East  Indian  mutiny  which  led  to  the  increasing  stringency  of  the 
London  money  market,  and  the  subsequent  commercial  disasters  in 
the  closing  months  of  that  awful  year. 

I  had  sent  Robert  Barret  over  to  our  Liverpool  house  some  time 
before  this,  and  in  October,  1857,  John  Walter  and  Sabina  went  to 
Liverpool,  and  sold  the  furniture  of  their  house,  southeast  corner  of 
Fifth  Avenue  and  Thirty-fourth  Street,  depositing  the  proceeds  to 
credit  of  John  Walter's  account  with  Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co. 

About  the  middle  of  October  our  bank  in  New  York  suspended 
specie  payments,  and  before  they  did  so,  there  was  a  heavy  run  upon 
them  for  gold.  Wall  Street  was  so  crowded  that  you  might  have 
walked  on  the  people's  heads.  We  (Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co.),  in 
order  to  have  some  specie,  drew  out  ten  thousand  dollars  in  gold 
from  the  Merchants'  Bank,  with  which  institution  we  then  did  our 
banking  business. 

As  well  as  I  can  remember,  and  as  far  as  I  can  find  out  from  the 
report  of  House  of  Commons'  Committee  of  1858,  or  the  Bank  Acts 
in  my  library,  J.  &  A.  Dennistoun  stopped  payment  on  Saturday, 
November  7,  published  in  Glasgow  upon  Monday,  November  9,  1857. 

Mr.  J.  E.  Coleman,  a  professional  accountant  of  London,  v/hen 
examined  before  the  above  named  committee  on  March  26,  1858, 
gave  the  following  evidence  : 

Question  1954.  "  There  is  a  house  in  your  list,  namely  No.  6  (Den- 
nistoun &  Co),  which  you  did  not  include  in  the  addition  that  you 
made  of  the  totals,  in  answer  to  a  former  question  ;  that  is  a  house  by 
far  the  largest  in  your  list.     Will  you  state  the  particulars  of  it  ?  " 

Answer.  "Their  liabilities  were  upwards  of  two  million  pounds 
sterling,  and  I  have  very  little  doubt  that  they  will  be  paid. 
I  am  of  opinion  that  that  house  would  not  have  suspended,  if  it 
had  not  been  for  the  large  amount  which  they  had  embarked  in  the 
shares  of  the  Liverpool  Borough  Bank,  and  their  inability  to  obtain 
advances  upon  real  and  good  properties  in  Scotland,  in  consequence 
of  the  failure  of  the  Western  Bank  of  Scotland.  I  do  not  think  that 
their  engagements  with  the  United  States,  although  they  were  enor- 
mous, would  have  compelled  them  to  have  stopped." 

Before  the  same  Committee  of  the    House    of  Commons  Mr.  J. 


324  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Robertson,*  manager  of  the  Union  Bank  of  Scotland  in  Glasgow, 
testified  in  April  30,  1858,  as  follows  : 

Question  4573.  "  Have  you  ever,  in  your  experience,  known  a  time 
of  such  extreme  financial  pressure,  accompanied  by  so  little  depres- 
sion or  failure  ?  " 

"  No,  so  far  as  Glasgow  is  concerned,  always  excepting  Dennis- 
toun's,  which  was  a  very  large  and  respectable  house." 

4574.  "  Dennistoun's  was  originally  a  Glasgow  house,  and  is  still 
a  Glasgow  house,  I  believe  ?  " 

"  It  is  a  Glasgow,  London,  and  Liverpool  house." 

4575.  "  The  embarrassment  of  Messrs.  Dennistoun  was  caused  by 
their  American  connection  ?  " 

"Yes." 

4576.  "  There  was  no  circumstance  connected  with  the  stoppage 
of  the  Banks  in  Glasgow  which  in  any  way  aggravated  the  embarras- 
ment  of  the  Messrs.  Dennistoun  &  Co.?  " 

"  Messrs.  Dennistoun  failed  on  the  Saturday  before  the  Glasgow 
banks  failed." 

4578.  "To  some  extent  their  embarrassment  might  be  said  to 
be  caused,  or  aggravated,  by  the  stopping  of  the  Borough  Bank  of 
Liverpool,  inasmuch  as  they  were  large  shareholders  in  that  bank, 
which  led  to  the  immediate  lock  up  of  a  large  amount  of  capital  ?  " 

"  I  believe  two  hundred  thousand  pounds,  which  represented  the 
par  value  of  these  shares  in  that  bank." 

4579.  "  Any  other  reason  ?  " 

"  And  by  the  discredit  which  naturally  attached  to  the  knowl- 
edge that  they  were  liable  to  be  called  upon  for  further  calls  to 
pay  the  liabilities  of  that  bank." 

The  chairman  of  the  above  named  Committee  of  the  House  of 
Commons  was  the  Right  Honorable  Edward  Cardwell,  who  became 
subsequently  Viscount  Cardwell.     Among  the  eighteen  members  of 

*  Mr.  J.  Robertson's  evidence  is  directly  at  variance  with  that  of  Mr.  Coleman, 
the  London  professional  accountant.  I  explain  the  discrepancy  in  this  way  :  My 
uncle  Alick  was  one  of  the  largest,  if  not  the  very  largest,  stockholders  of  the  Union 
Bank  of  Scotland.  It  was  Robertson's  cue  to  please  him,  and  throw  the  blame, 
not  on  the  Borough  Bank  shares,  where  it  rightfully  belonged,  but  on  the  head  of 
the  American  houses.  This  was  myself,  who  was  not  there  to  speak  in  my  own  de- 
fense, and  show  the  baselessness  of  Robertson's  statements. 


THE   DISASTROUS   YEAR    1857.  S^S 

the  committee  were  besides  Cardwell,  Williatfi  E.  Gladstone,  John 
Fergue,  Earl  Gifford,  George  Carr  Glyn,  subsequently  Lord  Wolver- 
ton,  Sir  James  Graham,  Sir  George  Cornwall  Lewis,  Sir  Charles 
Wood,  subsequently  Lord  Halifax. 

Since  writing  the  immediately  preceding  lines,  I  find  in  the 
Committee's  summary  : 

"  32.  The  house  of  Dennistoun  &  Co.  stopped  payment  on 
November  7.  It  is  expected  to  pay  its  liabilities  in  full,  and  its 
members  bear  the  highest  character.  But  it  can  occasion  no  sur- 
prise that,  on  the  occurrence  of  such  a  crisis  as  that  which  took 
place  in  America  last  year,  a  house  with  debts  owing  to  it  from  that 
country  of  nearly  two  million  pounds,  losing  at  the  same  time  three 
hundred  thousand  pounds  by  the  failure  of  the  Borough  Bank  of 
Liverpool,  of  which  the  partners  were  shareholders,  should,  at  a 
juncture  when  general  alarm  prevailed,  have  been  obliged  to  suspend 
payments." 

I  now  return  to  October,  1857,  in  New  York.  Toward  the  end  of 
that  month  I  was  laboring  under  intense  depression  of  spirits,  antici- 
pating disaster  through  the  Borough  Bank.  I  used  to  go  down 
daily  to  Wall  Street,  my  feet  feeling  as  if  I  were  shod  with  lead. 
About  November  16  or  17  I  got  very  ill,  and  someone,  I  don't  know 
who,  either  by  the  direction  of  the  elder  Dr.  Cheesman,  then  my 
physician,  or  without  it,  gave  me  opium  pills.  These,  instead  of 
quieting  my  nerves,  had  exactly  the  reverse  effect,  and  raised  my 
pulse  to  140.  Margaret  telegraphed  to  my  son-in-law,  T.  L.  Kane, 
and  lie  and  his  wife  came  on  from  Philadelphia,  and  persuaded  me 
to  bring  Margaret  and  her  children  with  me  to  visit  Philadelphia 
for  change  of  air  and  scene,  but  I  received  no  benefit.  I  became 
extremely  ill,  and  was  unable  to  return  to  New  York  till  about  the 
middle  of  December.  But  while  at  Fern  Rock,  Judge  Kane's  coun- 
try seat  and  at  that  time  my  daughter  Bessie's  home,  my  spirits 
began  to  revive,  as  I  recollect  enjoying  an  animated  dispute  with 
my  son-in-law,  Tom  Kane.  He  was  hoping  that  the  English  rule  in 
India  would  be  overthrown  after  the  Mutiny.  I  maintained  that  the 
English  Government  was  by  far  the  best  that  India  ever  had,  and  I 
predicted  that  after  the  Mutiny  was  put  down  it  would  be  more  per- 
fectly established  than  ever. 

From  Judge  Kane's  I  went  to  my  sister  Eliza's  in  New  York,  only 


326  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM   WOOD. 

passing  one  night  there,  and  going  on  with  Robert  Pell  to  my 
brother-in-law's  house  at  West  Point,  which  Mr.  Pell  had  kindly 
opened  for  us.  There  I  spent  Christmas,  1857,  Mr.  Pell  com- 
ing up  for  the  occasion  and  concocting  a  plum  pudding  to 
celebrate  it. 

Uncle  John  Dennistoun  came  out  here  in  January,  1858, 
to  look  into  our  affairs.  Walter  and  his  wife  had  returned 
to  New  York  by  this  time,  and  I  paid  them  a  visit  at  Mr. 
Redmond's  (Sabina's  father)  of  about  ten  days  about  the  end  of 
January. 

In  February,  1858,  John  Dennistoun  and  I  went  to  Niagara,  where 
he  had  never  been.  We  saw  people  crossing  on  the  ice  gorge  below 
the  falls.  The  weather  was  fine,  and  as  he  and  I  were  lying  on 
Table  Rock  looking  at  the  falls  and  at  the  magnificent  white  clouds 
floating  majestically  over  the  clear  blue  sky,  he  said  to  me,  pointing 
at  the  falling  water  :  "  William,  if  we  had  been  always  accustomed 
to  see  that,  and  had  never  before  gazed  upon  those,''  looking  upward 
to  the  clouds,  "  we  would  have  thought  them  the  more  wonderful  of 
the  two."  We  returned  to  New  York  via  Albany,  and  he  sailed  for 
Europe  either  in  the  end  of  February  or  beginning  of  March.  "  He 
went  on  his  way,  and  I  saw  him  no  more" — a  fine,  honorable,  up- 
right man  in  all  his  financial  dealings  :  his  word  as  good  as  his  bond. 
He  had  always  been  particularly  kind  and  affectionate  to  me,  and 
was  more  like  an  elder  brother  than  an  uncle.  There  was  only  five 
years  of  difference  in  our  ages.  We  corresponded  till  his  death, 
though  we  never  met  again. 

I  remained  in  New  York  with  J.  Walter  and  Dawson,  attending 
to  the  affairs  of  Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co.  In  the  summer  of  1858 
I  took  an  unfurnished  cottage  near  the  gas  house  in  Yonkers,  which, 
with  some  things  from  our  town  house,  Margaret  furnished  with 
cheap  summer  furniture,  and  we  were  wonderfully  comfortable.  I 
may  mention  here  that,  pending  the  arrangements  for  paying  the 
debts  of  the  firm,  each  partner  restricted  himself  to  a  certain  sum 
per  annum.  I  restricted  myself  to  ten  thousand  dollars  per  annum, 
which  was  a  come-down  from  twenty-five  thousand  dollars  per  an- 
num or  upward,  but  I  can't  say  I  ever  felt  the  difference  ;  and  if  I 
recollect  rightly,  James  Campbell  and  I  were  the  only  two  partners 
that  lived  within  our  agreed  income  for  three  years.     We  knew,  in 


THE   DISASTROUS   YEAR    1857.  327 

looking  over  our  affairs,  that  we  not  only  could  pay  all  our  debts, 
but  have  a  large  surplus,  and  with  certain  aid  from  the  then  great 
house  of  Overend,  Gurney  &  Co.  we  did,  in  November,  1858, ^ay 
all  our  creditors,  principal  arid  interest,  a  thing  which,  so  far  as  I 
know,  had  never  been  done  before  with  so  large  a  failure,  and  prob- 
ably never  will  be  done  again. 


CHAPTER    XXII. 

EVENTS    OF     THE    CIVIL    WAR. 

In  July,  1858,  I  took  Margaret  a  jaunt  to  Niagara  Falls  from 
Yonkers,  and  back  again  there  by  the  Erie  Railroad.  We  were  very 
proud  of  our  then  youngest  child,  Chalmers,  who  used  to  be  pushed 
along  the  Yonkers  avenues  in  the  first  perambulator  that  was  seen 
in  New  York,  sent  to  me  by  John  Dennistoun.  Chalmers  had  a  leg- 
horn hat  with  an  ostrich  feather,  and  a  band  of  ruby-colored  velvet 
round  the  hat. 

Next  year  (1859)  we  spent  the  summer  at  Mr.  Anstice's  house  near 
the  top  of  the  hill  at  Yonkers,  and  one  day  Mr.  Anstice  came  in  to  ask 
me  if  I  had  any  objection  to  allow  a  gentleman — the  Rev.  A.  Stone- 
Morrison — to  look  through  the  house,  as  he  hoped  to  get  him  for  a 
tenant  next  winter.  I  said  I  would  be  very  glad  to  see  the  gentle- 
man, and  when  he  came  in  I  said  to  him  :  "  You  don't  know  me, 
but  I  know  you,  and  a  great  deal  more  about  your  family  and  con- 
nections than  you  know  yourself."  I  then  told  him  :  "  You  are  a 
nephew  of  Captain  Archie  Morrison  of  Eaton  Hall,  near  Norwich, 
England,  who  was  a  cousin-german  of  Mr.  John  Kane,  my  first  wife's 
father."  He  and  all  the  Kane  family,  as  already  mentioned,  were 
loyalists  at  the  time  of  the  Revolution.  Captain  Archie  Morrison  got  a 
commission  in  the  British  army,  married  two  rich  wives,  and  lived 
in  great  style  at  Eaton  Hall,  near  Norwich,  England,  as  I  have,  I 
believe,  already  stated  in  the  earlier  part  of  this  narration.  My  son- 
in-law.  General  T.  L.  Kane,  when  a  young  lad,  paid  Captain  Mor- 
rison a  long  visit,  and  the  latter  was  so  much  pleased  with  him  that 
he  offered  to  leave  him  Eaton  Hall  and  all  his  property  if  he  would 
become  a  British  subject.  Tom  Kane  refused  to  do  this.  Captain 
Morrison  then  left  his  money  and  estate  to  the  Rev.  Mr.  Stone,  the 
son  of  his  sister,  and  he  took  the  name  of  Morrison  in  addition  to 
his  own,  and  became  the  Rev.  Stone-Morrison.  He  came  to  New 
York  and  bought  the  Sim  newspaper  from  the  Beaches,  with  the 
purpose  of  turning  it  into  a  religious  newspaper,  and  sank  all  the 

328 


EVENTS   OF   THE   CIVIL   WAR.  329 

money  he  had  inherited  from  Captain  Morrison  upon  it.  In  the 
spring  of  1859  I  walked  out  to  Yonkers  and  called  on  Rev.  Stone- 
Morrison  and  saw  in  his  house  a  portrait  of  Captain  Morrison  in  his 
scarlet  regimental  coat.  I  think  that  the  Stone-Morrisons  subse- 
quently went  to  South  Orange  and  then  to  Philadelphia,  but  I  have 
lost  sight  of  them  for  many  years  (November  19,  1892). 

We  returned  to  5  West  Sixteenth  Street  from  Yonkers  in  1859,  and 
I  have  no  recollection  of  anything  particular  occurring  in  that  year. 

I  insert  here  the  dates  when  my  children  joined  the  church  : 

Charlotte  joined  Dr.  Pott's  Presbyterian  Church,  corner  Tenth 
Street  and  University  Place,  Sunday,  May  13,  1849.  On  the  same 
day,  twenty  years  before,  her  mother  and  I  became  engaged  at  Mr. 
John  Hone's  house,  40  Warren  Street. 

John  Walter  joined  Dr.  Pott's  church,  Sunday,  November  10,  1850. 

Bessie  joined  Dr.  Pott's  church,  Sunday,  May  9,  1852. 

Harriet  Maria  joined  Collegiate  Reformed  Dutch  Church,  Fifth 
Avenue  and  Twenty-ninth  Street,  December  20,  1857. 

Willie  took  communion  at  the  Cathedral,  Bristol,  England,  Sun- 
day, May  3,  1857. 

Helen  joined  Collegiate  Dutch  Church,  Fifth  Avenue  and  Twenty- 
ninth  Street,  on  Sunday,  March  18,  i860,  being  converted  by  a  ser- 
mon of  the  never  very  popular  Dr.  Talbot  Chambers. 

Henry  Duncan  joined  Dr.  Tyng's  Episcopal  Church  in  April,  1872. 

Chalmers  joined  Dr.  John  Cotton  Smith's  Episcopal  Church  of  the 
Ascension. 

In  i860  I  have  nothing  to  note  of  the  first  half  of  the  year.  In 
summer  we  went  with  the  children  to  Knight's  boarding  house  and 
then  to  Mrs.  Ireland's  boarding  house,  Yonkers,  of  which  I  have 
no  recollection.  On  returning  to  5  West  Sixteenth  Street  we  found 
all  New  York  agog  about  the  impending  visit  of  the  Prince  of  Wales. 
He  came  accompanied  by  the  then  Duke  of  Newcastle,  a  great  per- 
sonal friend  of  Gladstone.  Isaac  Buchanan  wrote  to  me  from  Mon- 
treal that  I  would  find  the  duke  very  like  myself.  When  I  did  see 
him  I  was  not  particularly  complimented,  for,  had  I  not  known  him 
to  be  a  duke,  I  would  have  taken  him  for  a  red-whiskered  butcher. 
The  prince  was  very  well  received  in  New  York,  and  had  rooms  in 
the  then  new  Fifth  Avenue  Hotel.  His  own  room  was  on  the  second 
floor,  northwest  corner,  fronting  on  Fifth  Avenue  and  Twenty-third 


330  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

Street.  On  October  12  the  leading  citizens,  under  the  presidency  of 
Peter  Cooper,  gave  the  prince  a  grand  ball  in  the  Academy  of  Music> 
Fourteenth  Street  and  Irving  Place.  I  was  one  of  the  subscribers 
of,  I  think,  one  hundred  dollars,  and  got  tickets  for  myself  and 
wife  and  my  youngest  daughter,  Helen,  then  about  seventeen, 
her  elder  sister  Harriet  not  choosing  to  go.  There  were  ten  young 
beauties  of  the  leading  New  York  families  selected  to  dance  with  the 
prince.  Among  these  the  greatest  beauty  Avas  Lydia  S.  Mason,  eld- 
est daughter  of  Henry  Mason,  subsequently  Mrs.  Heyward  Cutting. 
(On  December  6,  1883,  she  became  my  sister-in-law  by  my  marriage 
to  her  next  sister,  Helen  Mason.)  Miss  Lydia,  while  dancing  with 
the  prince,  got  a  nail  through  the  sole  of  her  slipper  into  her  foot, 
but,  notwithstanding,  she  danced  out  the  dance.  Another  of  the  ten 
beauties  was  Augusta  Jay,  a  great  friend  of  my  daughter  Helen,  and 
who  became  subsequently  Mrs.  Randolph  Robinson.  The  dancing 
floor  was  composed  of  boards  fastened  over  the  pit,  and  in  the  middle 
of  the  ball  the  flooring  caved  in.  No  one  was  hurt,  but  it  took  some 
time  to  set  things  to  rights  ;  and  there  was  old  Brown,  the  well 
known  sexton  of  Grace  Church,  down  in  the  vacant  space  helping  to 
nail  up  the  boards,  and  looking  exactly  like  the  Grave  Diggers  in 
"Hamlet." 

In  December,  i860.  South  Carolina  seceded  from  the  United 
States,  and  so  the  first  step  in  our  bloody  Civil  War  was  taken,  and 
so  ended  i860,  with  gloomy  portents  in  many  hearts,  but  with  an 
unswerving  belief  in  my  own  that  ultimately  the  Union  would  be 
preserved.  In  the  end  of  December,  i860,  Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co. 
lent  money  to  the  United  States  Treasury  at  twelve  per  cent,  inter- 
est per  annum  !  Such  was  the  fear  of  the  result  of  the  Civil  War 
among  capitalists. 

I  have  no  notes  of  what  I  was  doing  in  the  first  important  months 
of  1861,  until  Saturday,  March  23,  1861,  when  I  sent  the  following 
letter  signed  "  Senex  "  to  the  Evening  Post,  and  headed  by  that 
paper 

"  THE    ONLY    SOLUTION    OF    OUR    DIFFICULTIES. 

"  To  the  Editor  of  the  Evening  Post  : 

"  In  your  leading  article  of  Thursday  evening  you  have  hit  the 
nail  on  the  head  — '  reiji  acu  tetigisti' — as  the  Latin  grammar  hath  it. 


EVENTS   OF   THE   CIVIL  WAR.  331 

Many  of  us  in  this  locality — '  mute,  inglorious  Miltons  ' — have  for 
many  weeks  past  been  groaning  and  moaning  to  one  another  over 
the  state  of  our  country,  but  usually  we  have  so  little  to  do  with,  and 
are  so  little  interested  in,  politics  that  we  do  not  know  how  to  make 
ourselves  heard  in  this  political  storm.  We  are  '  little  skilled  in  the 
set  phrase  of  words,'  could  not  address  political  meetings  if  we  tried, 
and  in  addition  probably  no  one  would  listen  to  us  if  we  did.  We 
have  no  skill  in  writing  political  articles  for  newspapers,  our  only 
literary  efforts  consisting  in  ordering  goods  and  counting  their  cost. 
But  we  feel  that  though  dumb  and  useless  to  point  out  remedies  for 
the  existing  evils  to  our  rulers  and  legislators,  no  class  is  more 
deeply  interested  in  the  welfare  of  our  common  country  than  we  are  ; 
and  even  as  Balaam's  ass  spoke  out  when  he  saw  the  angel's  destroy- 
ing sword,  so  am  I  constrained  to  urge  you  to  advocate  with  all  the 
power  of  your  pen  the  repeal  of  the  monstrous  Morrill  Tariff,  unless 
you  are  willing  to  see  our  magnificent  city  become  a  second  desolated 
Tyre — a  place  for  the  fishermen  to  hang  their  nets  on. 

"  Some  of  us,  in  our  mournful  meetings,  had  arrived  at  the  very 
conclusion  that  you  have  come  to,  that  the  way  to  save  the  country 
is  to  repeal  at  once  the  Morrill  Tariff  and  substitute  therefor  '  the 
sweet  simplicity  '  of  ten  per  cent,  ad  valorem  duty  upon  all  imported 
articles,  including  tea  and  coffee.  Do  this,  and  abandon  all  attempts 
to  coerce  the  seceding  States,  give  up  Fort  Sumter  to  the  foolish 
people  of  Charleston,  since  they  are  so  anxious  to  have  it — they 
will  keep  it  safely  and  in  proper  order  for  '  the  good  time  coming,' — 
but  let  the  Federal  Government  retain  all  the  forts  now  in  its  posses- 
sion along  the  coast  of  the  Atlantic  and  Gulf  of  Mexico,  not  for  the 
purpose  of  overawing  the  neighboring  States,  or  even  to  assist  in  the 
collection  of  revenue,  but  simply  in  the  interests  of  commerce. 
With  a  simple  tariff  of  ten  per  cent,  the  whole  stream  of  commerce 
would  flow  into  the  Northern  ports.  Free  trade  is  the  very  Malakoff 
of  our  position.  With  it  no  direct  shipments  would  go  South.  To  be 
sure  of  this  we  have  only  to  look  back  at  the  course  of  trade  for  the 
last  forty  or  fifty  years.  I  am  sorry  to  say  that  I  am  old  enough  to 
remember  the  state  of  trade  at  the  later  of  these  two  periods  between 
the  Southern  ports  and  Europe.  At  Charleston  and  New  Orleans 
particularly  there  were  twice  in  the  year — for  the  spring  and  fall 
trades — large  importations  of  dry  goods  direct  from  Europe,   but 


332  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

even  during  the  existence  of  this  direct  trade,  and  what  the  present 
generation  of  Southerners  look  back  upon  as  the  palmy  days  of  com- 
merce, the  trade  so  carried  on  was  almost  all  in  the  hands  of  foreign 
houses — the  Finleys,  Dennistouns,  Buchanans,  and  Woods,  who 
had  their  large  establishments  at  Charleston  and  New  Orleans.  This 
statement  you  will  find  borne  out  by  Vincent  Nolte  in  his  '  Fifty 
Years  in  Both  Hemispheres.'  In  fact,  fifty  years  ago  the  Southerners 
who  had  means  to  carry  on  a  direct  foreign  trade  looked  down 
with  a  very  aristocratic  contempt  upon  all  commercial  dealings,  and 
were  perfectly  willing  that  the  Scotch,  those  busy  '  hewers  of  wood 
and  drawers  of  water '  for  their  more  more  richly  born  brethren, 
should  relieve  them  of  the  drudgery,  even  if  they  pocketed  the 
profits. 

"  But  the  course  of  events  was  too  strong  even  for  the  Scotsmen, 
and  as  the  intercourse  between  the  North  and  South  was  accel- 
erated first  by  coasters,  and  then  by  Mississippi  and  sea-going  steam- 
ers, and  finally  by  railroads,  the  direct  business  between  Europe 
and  the  Southern  ports,  as  far  as  regarded  dry  goods,  entirely  ceased, 
and  the  houses  above  alluded  to  became  either  exporters  of  produce 
or  merchant  bankers,  or  shut  up  their  stores  and  vamosed  to 
regions  where  they  had  not  to  compete  with  the  persevering  activity 
of  New  England,  before  which  both  Scotsman  and  Jew  fall  down 
like  ninepins.  The  dry  goods  trade  of  these  Southern  cities  passed 
entirely  into  the  hands  of  men  from  the  Northern  States,  who  found 
that  they  could  assort  their  stores  much  better  by  buying  in  New 
York,  Philadelphia,  and  Boston  than  by  importing  direct  from 
Europe,  for  which  latter  operation  they  had  neither  the  capital  nor 
credit,  even  if  it  had  answered  in  a  pecuniary  point  of  view,  which 
it  did  not. 

"  Now,  except  by  artificial  legislation,  you  cannot  turn  back  the 
tide  of  human  events,  and  even  by  such  legislation  you  can  only  do 
it  temporarily  ;  but  the  temporary  turning  back  may  be  attended 
with  much  misery  and  ruin,  and  we  can  avoid  most  of  the  evil  by  a 
prompt  retracing  of  our  steps — by  repealing  the  Morrill  Tariff,  and 
by  substituting  therefor,  not  the  tariff  of  1857,  but  a  simple  ad 
valorem  duty  of  ten  per  cent,  on  all  imports.  With  such  a  duty  in 
the  North,  not  one  cargo  of  dry  goods  would  be  sent  from  Europe 
to  any  Southern  port.     Everything  would  come  to  New  York,  Bos- 


EVENTS   OF   THE   CIVIL   WAR.  333 

ton,  and  Philadelphia,  and  all  supplies  for  the  seceding  States  must 
be  got  from  these  ports.  Of  course  the  seceding  States  could 
raise  no  revenue  from  direct  importations,  and  must  resort  to  direct 
taxes  and  duties,  levied  obnoxiously,  along  their  inland  borders, 
which  I  look  upon  as  quite  impracticable. 

"  With  a  ten  per  cent,  tariff  in  the  United  States,  before  a  year 
passed,  and  without  any  coercion,  or  even  attempt  at  it,  on  the 
part  of  the  Federal  authorities,  to  levy  duties  in  the  seceding  States, 
we  should  hear  our  Southern  brethren  saying  :  '  I  will  arise  and  go 
to  my  father  ;'  and  even  '  while  they  were  yet  a  great  way  off,'  we 
should  most  warmly  welcome  them  back  to  the  paternal  and  fra- 
ternal mansion.  Then  out  of  all  the  miseries  of  the  last  four 
months  would  have  arisen  the  great  blessing  of  free  trade,  for  after 
a  ten  per  cent,  tariff  had  been  tried,  and  the  seceding  States  had 
returned  to  their  allegiance,  there  would  be  no  '  harking  back '  to 
protectionist  theories.  I  am  satisfied  by  personal  inspection  of 
their  factories,  and  comparison  with  those  in  Europe,  that  our  New 
England  brethr-en  can  successfully  compete  with  the  cotton  and 
woolen  manufactories  of  Europe,  if  they  will  only  trust  to  their 
own  energies,  instead  of  legislative  protection,  as  all  "  protection  ' 
means  only  '  robbing  someone  else.'  I  hope  to  live  to  see  the  day 
when,  as  that  veteran  free  trader,  William  Rathbone  of  Liverpool, 
once  said  in  an  Anti-corn  Law  speech  :  '  A  protected  trade  will  be 
as  disgraceful  as  a  protected  woman.' 

"  Some  of  my  growing  fellow-merchants  say  :  *  How  can  you 
hope  for  a  reduced  tariff  from  Lincoln  and  the  Republicans,  a 
main  plank  in  whose  platform  was  "  protection  to  native  industry  "  ? ' 
I  have  much  faith  in  the  necessity  of  the  case  and  in  the  truth  of 
the  old  saw:  ^  Magna  est  Veritas  et  prcEvalebit  j  '  and  is  not  '  his- 
tory, philosophy  teaching  by  example  ? '  Then  does  not  history 
teach  us  that  one  of  England's  greatest  ministers,  Sir  Robert  Peel, 
came  into  power  as  the  ardent  advocate  of  protection,  but  circum- 
stances became  too  strong  for  him  (as  they  will  be  for  Mr.  Lincoln), 
and  Sir  Robert  dealt  protection  its  deathblow  ?  And  under  Mr.  Lin- 
coln's beneficent  Presidency  we  may  live  to  see  the  grand  principles 
of  free  trade  carried  into  actual  practice,  and  thereby  have  an  end 
put  forever  to  one  great  cause  of  contention  between  North  and 
South,  the  only   genuine  cause  of  complaint   which  our  Southern 


334  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

brethren  really  have.  Then  shall  we  see  realized  on  the  banks  of 
our  own  majestic  Hudson  what  Pope  prophesied  of  a  far  inferior 
stream  150  years  ago  : 

"  '  The  time  shall  come  when,  free  as   waves  or  wind, 
Unbounded  Thames  shall  flow  for  all  mankind  ; 
Whole  navies  enter  with  each  swelling  tide, 
And  seas  but  join  the  nations  they  divide.'" 

On  April  29,  1861,  I  sent  the  following  to  the  Christian  Intelli- 
gencer^ the  organ  of  the  Reformed  Dutch  Church.  It  was  com- 
posed on  April  15,  while  walking  down  to  Wall  Street : 

"  Dear  Sir  : 

'"  The  raising  of  the  national  flag  on  the  steeple  of  the  Fifth 
Avenue  Reformed  Dutch  Church  and  the  old  Fulton  Street  Church 
makes  me  think  that  the  inclosed  lines,  written  on  the  morning  of 
the  isth  inst.,  on  the  fall  of  Fort  Sumter  and  bearing  upon  the  res- 
toration of  the  '  Stars  and  Stripes  '  to  that  fortress,  may  strike  a 
responsive  chord  in  the  hearts  of  the  various  congregations,  more 
especially  in  the  hearts  of  those  noble  young  men  who  have  gone 
out  from  us  to  defend  our  national  capital  and  protect  that  flag, 
which,  for  eighty-five  years,  has  been  known  all  over  the  world  as 
the  symbol  of  civil  and  religious  liberty. 

"  I  am,  dear  sir,  yours  faithfully, 

"  William  Wood." 
I. 

"  Wretched  and  sorrowful  my  lay, 
No  brilliant  deed  of  arms  I  tell, 
Sad  and  inglorious  was  the  fray 
In  which  Fort  .Sumter  fell. 

II. 
"  The  Rebel  camp  had  many  a  gun, 
Stolen  from  all  the  country  round, 
And  a  hundred  men  for  every  one 

That  in  the  leaguered  fort  was  found. 

III. 

"  Reduced  by  famine,  well  they  fought, 

Amid  the  red-hot  shot  and  shell, 

Till  fire  at  last  their  barracks  caught. 

And  then  their  noble  banner  fell. 


EVENTS   OF   THE   CIVIL   WAR. 


335 


"  And  in  its  place  the  felon  flag 

Now  floats  upon  the  southern  breeze, 
The  scorn  of  all  but  those  who  brag 
Beneath  the  tall  palmetto  trees. 


"  Up,  Union  men  !     Spring  to  your  feet, 
Restore  again  the  Stripes  and  Stars, 
The  flag  that  never  knew  defeat 
In  all  our  glorious  wars. 


"  Down,  down  with  every  traitor, 
Twiggs,  Hardee,  Beauregard, 
Nerve  our  right  arms,  Creator  ! 
Thine  is  our  cause,  O  Lord  !  " 

On  April   25,   1861,  the   Journal  of  Commerce  published   under 
the  heading  of 

"  PATRIOTIC    FUND. 

"  The  following  additional  sums  have  been  subscribed  : 


George  Collins, 

.     $100 

Mulford  &  Mark, 

$200 

Edward  H.  Ludlow, 

100 

H.   Meigs,  Jr.,  &  Smith,  . 

250 

Charles  Easton, 

500 

Alexander  Van  Rensselaer, 

500 

A.  W.  Spier  &  Co.,       . 

100 

D.  H.  Arnold,  . 

100 

John  T.  Metcalf, 

100 

E.  B.  Clayton  &  Co.,     . 

250 

Beebe  &  Brother, 

200 

George  Palen,    . 

100 

Henry  Owen, 

100 

Isaac  H.  Barley,    . 

100 

Bernhard  Mayer, 

100 

Maurey  Brothers, 

50 

Cary  &  Co., 

300 

George  C.  Ward,  , 

250 

George  A.  Schnelzel,     . 

100 

Wm.  Whitlock,  Jr., 

500 

A.  S.  Jarvis, 

50 

William  Wood, 

250 

Drake  Mills, 

100 

Sparkman,  Truslow  &  Co., 

100 

F.  L.  Talcott, 

50 

Third  Avenue  R.  R.  Co., 

2,000 

C.  F.  Dambman  &  Co., 

500 

William  B.  Astor, 

15,000 

P.  M.  Lydig.     . 

500 

George  Schnelzel, 

100 

[Signed]  "  William  E.  Dodge,  Chairman. 

"  Theodore  Dehon,  Treasurer." 

The  following  is  from  the  correspondence  of  the  New  York  Tribune 
in  reference  to  my  son-in-law,  Thomas  L.  Kane,  and  his  regiment  of 


336  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"Bucktails";  also  called  "  Wildcats,"  because  they  came  from  that 
part  of  Pennsylvania  called  the  "  Wildcat"  country,  but  the  desig- 
nation of  "  Bucktails  "  was  soon  adopted  and  became  permanent  : 

"  Harrisburg,  May  4,  1861. 

"  One  of  the  most  notable  instances  of  persevering  patience  and 
determination  which  has  occurred  since  the  President's  proclamation, 
is  that  of  mustering  the  "  Wildcats  "  of  this  State,  by  Colonel  Thomas 
L.  Kane,  who  has  taken  up  his  residence  in  the  county  of  McKean  in 
the  very  heart  of  what  is  termed  'the  Wildcat  District.'  On  receiv- 
ing the  proclamation  he  started  out  on  horseback  to'arouse  the  hardy 
sons  of  the  forest  in  the  counties  of  McKean,  Elk,  Cameron,  and 
Potter.  He  traveled  over  500  miles  on  his  horse,  enlisted  307  men, 
and  entered  Harrisburg  with  them  in  13  days  from  the  time  he 
started  out.  The  men  were  brought  from  the  backwoods.  Three 
hundred  and  seven  men  averaged  80  miles  travel  on  foot  to  reach 
Sinnemahoning  River.  At  different  points  on  this  stream  they  took 
rafts  and  floated  down  to  Rattlesnake,  on  the  Sunbury  and  Erie 
Railroad  in  Clinton  county,  where  they  could  find  ready  conveyance 
to  '  civilization.'  Over  one-half  of  these  307  men  are  '  crack ' 
shooters,  who  have  taken  prizes  at  all  the  '  shooting  matches  '  in  the 
Wildcat  district,  and  all  were  selected  for  being  '  good  shots.'  They 
are  armed  with  their  own  rifles,  and  are  determined  to  retain  them 
when  hunting  Southern  game.  They  are  professional  hunters,  rafts- 
men, surveyors,  land-hunters,  and  lumbermen,  who  are  already  used 
to  camp  life  and  long  tramps. 

"  When  at  Sunbury  they  received  a  dispatch  from  Governor  Cur- 
tin  that  not  more  than  140  were  wanted.  They  unanimously 
resolved  that  they  would  come  to  Harrisburg,  and  if  not  accepted, 
they  would  at  once  go  to  Washington  and  go  through  to  Baltimore. 

"  They  came  into  this  city  bearing  a  huge  pair  of  buck  horns  in 
front,  and  each  one  having  a  tail  of  a  deer  ornamenting  his  soft- 
felt  hat.  They  have  been  mustered  in  and  form  a  regiment  with 
the  companies  from  Tioga,  who  have  the  same  characteristics. 
These  men  are  in  earnest,  and  when  they  draw  the  trigger  of  their 
rifles,  they  do  not  intend  to  waste  powder.  Colonel  Kane  was 
last  evening  elected  Colonel  of  this  'Wildcat'  regiment.  His  repu- 
tation for  hard  service  is  well  known,  and  his  loyalty  is  unflinching." 


EVENTS   OF   THE   CIVIL   WAR.  337 

On  May  9,   1861,  I  wrote  the  following  rhymes  on  the  foregoing 
text  : 

"  lluirah  for  the  Union  !    the  stripes  and  the  stars, 
Colonel  Kane  and  his  Bucktails  are  bound  for  the  wars. 
No  holiday  soldiers  for  pomp  and  parade, 
But  for  sharp  shooting  famous,  and  keenness  of  blade  ; 
They  all  love  their  colonel,  they  well  know  his  worth, 
At  his  call  they  rushed  forth  from  their  homes  in  the  North. 
For  they  knew  he  had  justice  and  honor  in  view. 
And  courage  unflinching  his  course  to  pursue. 
How  strange  that  a  leader  so  fragile  and  small, 
Should  be  followed  by  troopers  so  stalwart  and  tall  ! 
But  they  knew  the  big  soul  in  his  body  that  dwelt. 
And  unbounded  reliance  they  all  of  them  felt. 
Hurrah  for  the  Bucktails  !  may  history  crown 
Their  efforts  to  vanquish  and  put  treason  down. 
With  so  gallant  a  leader,  so  righteous  a  cause  ; 
Well  they'll  strike  for  the  Union,  and  fight  for  the  laws  ; 
Oh  !  sharp  be  the  battle,  and  short  be  the  war, 
And  may  traitors  and  treason  be  banished  afar  ; 
While  strife  in  our  borders  forever  shall  cease, 
And  Kane  and  his  men  seek  their  mountains  in  peace." 

I  find  the  following  letter  of  mine  written  and  sent  to  the  Evening 
Post,  April  19,  1861,  but  not  published  till  May  16,   1861,  headed  : 

"  A  GENERAL  VIEW    OF  THE  CONTEST THE  PROBABILITIES. 

"  To  the  Editor  of  the  Evening  Post  : 

"  It  has  been  a  glorious  sight  to  see  the  manner  in  which  the 
Northern  heart  has  responded  as  the  heart  of  one  man  to  the  war 
proclamation  of  the  President.  The  declaration  of  an  active  and 
decided  policy  instead  of  that  gentle  bleating  of  '  peace,  peace,  when 
there  was  no  peace,'  has  met  with  the  cordial  approbation  of  the  vast 
majority  of  the  population  of  the  Northern  States,  from  the  blooming 
maiden  of  sixteen  sumtners  to  the  aged  man  to  whom  '  the  grass- 
hopper has  become  a  burden.'  The  policy  just  inaugurated,  if  acted 
upon  by  an  honest  administration  five  months  ago,  would  have  nipjjed 
secession  in  the  bad,  and  even  if  circumstances  had  remained  as  tliey 
were  last  Monday  (April  15),  the  war  policy  pursued  to  its  legitimate 
conclusion,  would,  I  doubt  not,  have  eventually  brought  back  the 
seven  seceding  States  into  the  bosom  of  the  Union.     On  that  day  I 


338  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

was  heartily  for  war  to  the  'bitter  end,'  and  was  so  excited  on  the 
subject  that  I  wrote  some  six  verses  on  the  fall  of  Sumter  and  sent 
them  to  you  (and  by  the  way  you  never  published  them,  so  I  sup- 
pose you  did  not  think  them  quite  so  '  germane  to  the  matter  '  as  I 
did  ;  but  let  that  pass).     One  of  the  verses  was  as  follows  : 

"  '  Up,  Union  men  !  spring  to  your  feet, 
Restore  again  the  Stripes  and  Stars, 
The  flag  that  never  knew  defeat 
In  all  our  glorious  wars.' 

"  That  was  my  feeling  on  Monday  last,  but  since  then  we  have 
heard  of  the  secession  of  Virginia,  to  be  followed,  I  doubt  not,  by  that 
of  North  Carolina  and  Tennessee,  and  probably  Kentucky  and 
Arkansas,  leaving  possibly  with  us  of  the  slave  States  only  Delaware, 
Maryland,  and  possibly  Missouri  ;  perhaps  also  Western  Virginia. 
Now  with  such  a  small  portion  of  the  slave  States  adhering  to  us,  I 
hold  that  the  policy  of  endeavoring  to  coerce  the  seceding  States 
back  into  the  Union  is  extremely  doubtful — to  say  the  least  of  it. 
With  only  Delaware,  Maryland,  and  Western  Virginia,  and  Missouri 
adhering  to  us,  the  slave  element  would  be  reduced  to  such  modest 
proportions  that  the  free  States  could  easily  give  to  the  slave  owners 
of  these  States  an  adequate  compensation  and  free  all  these  slaves, 
thus  giving  us  a  united  population  with  homogeneous  institutions. 

"  While  thus  banishing  negro  slavery  from  our  borders,  let  us  at 
the  same  time  banish  another  sort  of  slavery,  which  holds  down  and 
oppresses  white  labor — I  mean  the  slavery  of  a  protective  tariff. 
Let  the  manufacturing  and  coal  and  iron  interests  of  New  England, 
Pennsylvania,  and  Maryland  abandon  selfishness  and  be  satisfied 
with  the  protection  which  God  and  nature  have  given  them  in  near- 
ness to  markets,  skillful  hands,  and  inventive  minds.  Let  us  raise  as 
much  revenue  as  we  can  by  a  simple  tariflf  of  ten  per  cent,  on  all 
imported  articles,  including  tea  and  coffee,  and  if  that  will  not  yield 
enough  for  the  purposes  of  government,  raise  the  balance  of  what 
may  be  necessary  by  direct  taxation. 

"  With  Delaware,  Maryland,  Western  Virginia,  and  Missouri  ad- 
hering to  the  free  States,  we  should  have  natural  boundaries  of 
rivers  for  by  far  the  greater  portion  of  our  Southern  frontier,  and 
with  homogeneous  institutions  and  a  lotv  tariff  wo:  should  be  a  united, 


EVENTS    OF   THE    CIVIL   WAR.  339 

a  prosperous,  and  a  happy  people,  more  so  than  we  shall  be  should 
we  be  able  to  coerce  the  seceding  States  back  into  the  Union  with 
us  ;  for,  supposing  such  an  event  accomplished,  we  could  not  hang 
all  the  secession  leaders,  liowever  richly  they  may  deserve  it  ;  neither 
could  we  banish  them  from  political  power.  Your  Davises, 
Toombses,  Priors,  Y^tiii's,  ^  et /wc genus  omne,'  would  again  be,  as 
they  have  heretofore  been,  '  the  flies  in  the  ointment  of  the  apothe- 
cary, which  caused  it  to  send  forth  a  stinking  savor.'  The  '  wicked 
would  not  cease  from  troubling  '  nor  allow  '  the  weary  to  be  at 
rest.'  Therefore,  if  the  slave  States  are  prepared  to  leave  us  in  a 
body,  let  them  go.  It  was  an  entirely  different  matter  when  only  seven 
of  them  proposed  to  leave  us.  Then  we  were  bound,  not  only  by 
what  was  due  to  ourselves,  but  what  was  due  to  the  Union  rnen  of  the 
loyal  slave  States,  to  coerce  the  seceders  back  into  the  Union  ;  but 
now  that  all  the  actual  slave  States  (for  I  do  not  regard  Delaware, 
Maryland,  Western  Virginia,  and  Missouri,  except  as  temporarily,  in 
that  category)  have  left  or  will  leave  us,  we  have  nothing  to  consider 
but  our  own  interest  in  the  matter,  and  that  may  be  attained  by 
acting  on  Dogberry's  advice  to  the  constables  when  he  told  them  to 
'  Comprehend  all  vagrom  men  in  the  prince's  name.'  And  the 
constables  proceed  to  ask  him:  'But  how  if  they  will  not  stand  ? ' 
'  Why,  then,'  says  he,  '  bid  them  go,  and  thank  God  you  are  rid  of 
a  knave.' 

"  But  while  I  would  not  push  the  war  policy  so  far  as  to  compel 
a  return  of  all  the  slave  States  into  the  Union,  I  would  not  stop 
the  mustering  of  the  'plumed  troops'  for  'the  big  war,'  but,  in 
accordance  with  the  President's  proclamation,  push  forward  all  the 
men  that  have  been  called  or  may  be  called  for,  and  I  would  strictly 
blockade  every  Southern  port.  In  fact,  my  policy  would  be  to  con- 
vince the  South  that  the  North  is  both  able  and  willing  to  fight, 
points  upon  which  the  fire-eaters  profess  to  be  skeptical.  The  best 
way  to  maintain  peace  is  to  be  perfectly  prepared  for  war.  Let  the 
North  be  so,  but  then  before  we  actually  '  cry  havoc  and  let  slip  the 
dogs  of  war,'  let  us  take  a  calm  view  of  our  position  and  of  the 
Southern  seceding  States,  and  when  we  are  in  a  position  to  show 
them  that  we  can  dictate  our  own  terms,  let  us  agree  upon  a  basis  of 
amicable  separation.  And  what  would  be  the  result  within  a  few 
years  ?     Virginia  and  Kentucky,  by  the  'oozing  '  out  of  their  slaves 


340  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

northward  and  their  sale  southward,  would  become  free  States.  As 
it  is  a  cardinal  point  in  the  creed  of  the  Southern  Confederate 
States  that  any  State  may  secede  when  it  chooses,  of  course  no 
opposition  would  be  made  to  Virginia  and  Kentucky  rejoining  the 
United  States.  This  would  throw  North  Carolina  and  Tennessee 
into  the  border  States,  where  the  same  process  would  go  on,  until  at 
last  all  the  slaves  would  be  confined  within  the  Gulf  cotton  States  ; 
but  in  the  meantime,  while  the  slaves  were  increasing  in  these  local- 
ities, the  demand  for  their  cotton  would  be  greatly  diminished.  I 
hold  it  as  a  fixed  fact  that,  however  the  present  controversy  may 
end,  the  cotton  States  have  sealed  the  doom  of  their  monopoly  of 
that  article.  [How  contrary  is  the  result  ! — 1893.]  England  and 
France  will  gradually  but  decidedly  cease  to  depend  entirely  upon 
the  cotton  States  for  their  supply  of  the  staple.  I  consider  that  in 
the  future  the  Gulf  States  will  find  themselves  over-supplied  with 
slave  labor,  while  the  decreased  value  of  the  products  of  slave  labor 
will  make  the  planters  themselves  eager  for  emancipation. 

"  Let  us,  then,  be  thoroughly  prepared  for  '  bloody  war,'  with  all 
its  *  pomp  and  circumstance  '  ;  but  let  us  pause  before  we  actually 
draw  the  sword  and  throw  away  the  scabbard  and  proceed  to  smite 
our  erring  brethren. 

"  War  is  a  ruffian,  all  with  guilt  defiled, 
That  from  the  aged  father  tears  his  child. 
A  murderous  fiend,  by  fiends  adored, 

That  starves  the  sire  and  kills  the  son. 
The  husband  kills,  and  from  her  hoard 

Steals  all  his  widow's  toil  hath  won  ; 
Plunders  God's  world  of  beauty,  rends  away 
All  comfort  from  the  night,  all  safety  from  the  day. 

"Senex  (Wm.  Wood)." 


CHAPTER  XXIII. 

DISSOLUTION    OF     PARTNERSHIP    WITH    MY    UNCLES    AND    EVENTS     OF 
HOME    LIFE    DURING    THE    FIRST    YEAR    OF    THE    WAR, 

In  December,  x86i,  died  my  second  cousin  and  old  companion  in 
youth,  Alexander  Wood,  a  Scottish  advocate  and  sheriff  substitute  of 
Berwickshire.  He  was  born  in  1810,  and  became  a  pupil  of  the 
Edinburgh  Academy  at  its  establishment  in  1824,  and  had  the  honor 
of  being  the  first  dux,  and  of  carrying  the  first  gold  medal  of  that 
institution  over  the  head  of  Archibald  Tait,  afterward  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury.  He  subsequently  studied  at  the  Universities  of  St. 
Andrew's  and  Cambridge.  In  the  year  1834  he  was  admitted  to  the 
Scottish  bar,  and  in  1850  was  appointed  sheriff  substitute  of  Ber- 
wickshire. The  duties  of  that  office  he  performed  in  a  manner 
highly  creditable  to  himself  and  satisfactory  to  the  legal  profession 
and  to  the  public.  He  was  the  second  son  of  my  father's  cousin- 
german,  Henry  Wood  of  Edinburgh. 

In  the  summer  of  1861  I  rented  the  house  of  Elon  Comstock, 
Warburton  Avenue,  Yonkers.  He  was  then  one  of  the  principal 
owners  of  the  New  York  Journal  of  Commerce.  In  the  course  of 
the  summer  the  first  battle  of  the  Rebellion  was  fought  near  Wash- 
ington, and  in  the  morning  we  learned  from  the  papers  that  it  had 
been  won  by  the  Union  troops,  and  were  greatly  rejoiced  thereat. 
Margaret,  the  children,  and  I,  including  my  daughters  Harriet  and 
Helen,  started  off  on  a  jaunt,  the  younger  ones  and  Margaret  in  a 
carriage  and  the  rest  of  us  on  foot,  to  visit  Aunt  Maria  and  Mr.  De 
Peyster  and  the  Van  Rensselaersat  Rye  on  the  East  River  or  Sound. 
We  spent  the  day  there  very  pleasantly,  returning  to  Yonkers  in  the 
evening,  and  greatly  to  our  disappointment  and  disgust,  found  that 
the  rose-colored  reports  of  the  morning  were  all  wrong,  and  that  the 
Union  army  had  been  ignominiously  put  to  flight  by  the  rebels  at 
what  was  called  \\\q  first  hzXXXo.  oi  Bull  Run,  on  July  21,  1861. 

In  the  beginning  of  this  year  (1861)  I  omitted  to  state  that  in  the 
Edinburgh  Gazette  of  February  8,  1861,  it  is  advertised  on  page  199 

341 


342  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

that  William  Wood,  B.  F.  Dawson,  and  J.  Walter  Wood,  by  mutual 
consent  retired  on  December  31,  i860,  from  the  several  firms  of 
Dennistoun,  Cross  &  Co.,  London,  Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co.,  New 
York,  A.  &  J.  Dennistoun  &  Co.,  New  Orleans,  and  J.  &  A. 
Dennistoun,  Glasgow. 

The  same  form  of  advertisement  is  repeated  in  the  London  Gazette 
of  February  12,  1861,  page  620. 

My  partnership  with  my  uncles  began  in  October,  1828,  before  I 
was  twenty,  but  was  then  confined  to  a  house  we  had  at  that  time 
in  New  York,  under  the  firm  of  Dennistoun,  MacGregor  &  Co., 
which  was  dissolved  in  October,  1829,  owing  to  the  misconduct  of 
MacGregor  in  New  Orleans,  rendering  it  necessary  for  William  C. 
Mylne  to  go  and  reside  there.  I,  though  under  twenty-one  years  of 
age,  would  have  been  alone  in  New  York,  but  in  1829  my  uncles 
Alexander  and  John  Dennistoun  joined  me  as  partners  in  the  Trin- 
idad business,  handed  over  to  me  by  my  uncle,  Walter  Wood,  this 
firm  being  in  Trinidad  George  Reed  &  Co.,  and  in  Glasgow  William 
Wood  &  Co.  ;  subsequently,  in  1832,  this  latter  firm  was  transferred 
to  Liverpool,  when  I  went  to  reside  there  in  May,  1832. 

This  dissolution  of  December  31,  i860,  severed  all  business  part- 
nership between  my  uncles  and  myself,  after  it  had  existed  in  one 
form  or  another  for  thirty-two  years.  I  felt  sad  at  the  time,  but 
from  the  Borough  Bank  affair  had  made  up  my  mind  to  avail  myself 
of  a  break  in  the  partnership  deed  at  that  time,  and  never  go  into 
partnership  again.  Both  my  uncles  were  the  soul  of  business  honor, 
but  I  was  especially  attached  to  John,  the  younger,  who  was  only 
five  years  older  than  myself,  and  more  like  a  brother  than  an  uncle. 

Although  we  were  beaten  by  Beauregard  at  the  first  battle  of  Bull 
Run,  on  July  21,  1861,  yet  I  seem  to  have  been  in  pretty  good  spirits 
as  soon  after  as  July  31,  1861,  when  I  wrote  the  following  at 
Yonkers  : 

Will  Wood  he  lived  at  Yonkers, 

At  leasfhe  spent  the  summer  there  ; 
His  wife's  name  it  was  Margaret, 

And  she  kept  her  house  with  care. 
Their  family,  'tis  said,  was  large. 

Their  hospitalities  were  small, 
And  truth  would  not  be  broke 

If  you  called  them  none  at  all  ! 


EVF-NTS   OF    HOME    LIFE.  343 

Bui  once  they  did  determine, 

Harry  Redmond  to  invite 
To  spend  with  them  at  Yonkers 

A  summer's  day  and  night. 
So  Margaret  told  the  butcher  boy 

That  day  to  increase  their  fare, 
And  send  them  four  pounds  of  lamb  chops 

And  a  beefsteak  chosen  with  care. 

But,  alas  !  this  wicked  butcher 

This  order  didn't  attend, 
And  so  young  Harry's  dinner 

Near  came  to  an  untimely  end. 
But  just  before  the  dinner  hour 

Cook  to  her  "missus"  came  : 
"  There's  nought  in  house  for  dinner,  mum, 

But  tliis  here  lot  of  bread." 

At  this  was  Mrs.  Margaret  Wood 

Most  dreadful  took  aback, 
And  shouted  to  her  husband  dear  : 

"  Alack  !  dear  Will,  alack  ! 
Oh  !  won't  you  go  to  Yonkers,  Will, 

And  bring  '  summut '  home  to  eat  ; — 
A  tongue,  a  pound  of  butter, 

Or  lamb  that's  fresh  and  sweet  ?  " 

Will  heard  his  loving  wife's  complaint, 

.Scarce  gave  her  time  the  whole  to  utter, 
Ere  he  started  off  to  Yonkers  and 

Himself  brought  home  tongue,  lamb,  and  butter. 
Next  time  a  guest  they  entertain 

I  hope  this  wicked  butcher  boy 
Will  better  mind  his  business, 

Nor  Mrs.  Margaret  Wood  annov. 


AN  INCIDENT. 

As  Helen  at  the  breakfast  table  sat, 
She  said  :   "  Papa,  just  think  what  they  are  at. 
Our  darling  '  Seventh,'  whom  we  girls  adore, 
Are  by  gorillas  from  the  Southern  shore. 
To  be  attacked  and  eaten  by  the  brutes, 
Unless  each  gallant  lad  some  fifty  shoots." 


344  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  Guerillas,  not  gorillas,  my  dear  child," 

Paterfamilias  says  in  accents  mild, 

"  The  first  is  Spanish  for  an  armed  band, 

Of  peasants  roving  over  all  the  lat'd, 

And  though  the  South  has  always  dealt  in  slaves, 

For  bondsmen's  work  their  liaughty  nature  craves, 

I  never  heard  that  to  Virginia's  capes 

They  ever  had  imported  fighting  apes." 

"  W^ell,  well,"  quoth  Helen,  "  peasants  be  they  or  baboons 

Our  Seventh  'ill  whip  them  all,  besides  dragoons." 

In  1862  the  Civil  War  was  still  raging,  but  I  never  had  the  least 
doubt  of  its  ultimate  result,  although  it  "dragged  its  slow  length 
along  "  much  longer  than  I  had  calculated  upon. 

In  August  of  this  year,  Margaret  and  I,  with  Dennistoun,  Duncan, 
and,  I  fancy,  Chalmers  and  Van  Home,  went  up  to  Catskill  Mountain 
House,  and  there  I  met  my  friend  and  fellow-alumnus  of  the  Univer- 
sit}'-  of  Glasgow  (although  twenty  years  after  me),  the  Rev.  William 
M.  Taylor.  The  day  after  our  arrival  he  and  I  took  a  long  walk  to 
the  highest  point  of  the  Catskill  range.  I  caught  cold  in  the  liver, 
and  suffered  excruciating  pain,  and  thought  I  was  going  to  die,  and 
could  get  no  brandy,  all  the  house  being  shut,  nor  could  any  doctor 
be  found.  I  lay  awake  all  night,  thinking  how  in  the  world  they 
would  get  my  coffin  down  the  mountain  to  the  North  River.  How- 
ever, in  a  day  or  two  I  got  better,  and  enjoyed  the  mountain  air  and 
scenery,  taking  some  long  walks  with  my  sons  Dennistoun  and  Dun- 
can. From  the  Catskills  we  returned  to  our  hired  house  in  Yonkers, 
which  I  had  taken  for  the  second  time,  during  the  summer  of  1862. 
I  ought  to  have  mentioned  that  on  March  2,  1862,  I  bought  from 
Gordon  W.  Burnham  the  house,  4  West  Eighteenth  Street,  after 
having  looked  over,  with  Margaret,  no  less  than  forty-five  houses  in 
all.  None  of  the  others  we  liked  as  well,  but  had  nearly  made  up 
our  minds  to  buy  the  house  on  the  northeast  corner  of  Thirty-first 
Street  and  Madison  Avenue.  After  we  had  looked  over  it  all  except 
the  cellar,  I  fortunately  said  to  Margaret,  "  Before  we  decide  let  us 
go  and  look  at  it  ?  "  We  did,  and  found  a  foot  a?id  a-half  of  water  in 
it.  The  house  is  at  the  lowest  point  of  Murray  Hill,  and  all  the  sur- 
face water  flows  down  to  it. 

I    bought    the    house,    4  West    Eighteenth    Street,    at    the    low 
figure  of  twenty-five  thousand  dollars,  owing  to   the   existing  Civil 


EVENTS    OF    HOME    LIFE.  345 

War  which  prevented  Mr.  Thomas  Holland,  Burnham's  brother- 
in-law,  for  whom  he  had  built  it,  from  buying  it.  All  his 
assets  were  in  the  hands  of  the  rebels  at  New  Orleans,  and  in 
consequence,  he  was  for  the  time  poverty  stricken  and  could  not 
purchase. 

I  think  my  lease  of  5  West  Sixteenth  Street  was  extended  after 
May  I,  1862,  as  long  as  I  wanted  it,  for  we  returned  in  the  fall  of 
1862  to  that  house,  and  it  was  while  living  there  that  I  purchased 
this  one.  I  did  so,  although  I  had  been  paying  two  thousand  dollars 
currency  per  annum  rent.  The  owners  of  5  West  Sixteenth  Street 
offered  me  a  five  years'  lease  at  fifteen  hundred  dollars  in  gold. 
At  that  time  in  1862,  gold  was  from  par  to  one  per  cent,  premium, 
and  I  made  it  part  of  the  bargain  with  Gordon  W.  Burnham  for  4 
West  Eighteenth  Street,  that  when  the  title  deeds  were  found  to  be 
correct,  he  was  to  take  a  certified  check  in  currency  for  the  cost  at 
par,  and  the  house  was  paid  for  to  Burnham,  March  2,  1862.  In 
order  to  furnish  our  new  house,  4  West  Eighteenth  Street,  I  gave 
Margaret  eight  thousand  dollars  to  procure  furniture,  carpets, 
etc.,  etc.,  according  to  her  own  taste.  Part  of  this  money  was 
obtained  by  an  auction  sale  of  a  part  of  the  furniture  in  5  West  Six- 
teenth Street.  On  our  return  from  Anstice's  house  at  Yonkers,  we 
went  to  5  West  Sixteenth  Street  before  the  auction  sale  of  furniture, 
and  one  day  in  early  October,  1S62,  I  think,  moved  over  to  this 
house.  This  was  on  a  fine  afternoon,  Margaret  leading  tlie  way  and 
showing  me  with  no  little  pride  how  nicely  she  had  furnished  the 
house,  hung  the  pictures,  etc.,  etc.  I  have  no  recollection  how  the 
rest  of  1862  was  spent,  but  have  a  dim  idea  that  it  was  about  that 
time  I  sent  a  letter  to  Thomas  L.  Kane,  then  in  the  front  with  his 
Bucktail  Regiment,  with  my  ideas  regarding  the  management  of  the 
emancipated  slaves,  whom  I  thought  ought  to  be  cared  for  and 
treated  as  wards  of  the  United  States  under  lawyers  to  be  appointed 
in  the  Southern  districts.  With  this  letter  of  mine  Colonel  Kane 
was  very  much  pleased,  saying  that  if  he  had  been  near  any  printing 
press  he  would  have  had  it  printed  and  circulated,  and  I  think  he 
said  he  had  sent  a  copy  to  Stanton.  The  press  copy  of  my  letter  and 
Tom  Kane's  reply  I  had  in  my  library  desk  within  three  months  for 
the  purpose  of  copying  them  into  this  biography,  and  now  (February 
23,  1893)  I  have  put  them  away  so  carefully  that  I  cannot  find  them 


346  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

high  or  low.  Should  they  subsequently  turn  up,  I  may  yet  embody 
them  in  this  autobiography,  as  I  am  free  to  admit  that  I  considered 
my  letter  on  the  subject  rather  a  statesman-like  production  !  If  I 
could  find  and  read  it,  this  rose-colored  view  might  be  much  modified. 
I  don't  recollect  anything  more  of  1862,  and  in  the  latter  part  of  it 
and  the  beginning  of  1863,  we  got  comfortably  settled  in  4  West 
Eighteenth  Street. 

I  see  that  on  May  20,  1863,  when  on  a  visit  to  my  son  Willie, 
then  at  Northampton,  Mass.,  I  wrote  the  following  sonnet  on  Tom 
Kane's  return  from  the  battle  of  Rappahannock,  badly  wounded  : 

"  Home  from  the  Rappahannock's  bloody  strife, 
On  litter  borne,  with  scarce  a  spark  of  life  ; 
Through  two  sad  years,  though  wounded,  weak,  and  worn, 
Thy  gallant  spirit  has  thee  nobly  l:)orne, 

Seeking  thy  country's  good,  all  good  above,  ' 

With  patient  ardor  like  a  woman's  love. 
Not  that  phosphoric  light  which  never  warms 
Those  hearts  which,  safe  at  home  from  war's  alarms, 
With  traitors  sympathize,  for  rebels  feel. 
And  only  vilify  the  true  and  leal, 
In  future  days  union  and  peace  shall  reign, 
Children  be  taught  the  name  of  General  Kane, 
And  learn  from  him  to  strive  for  truth  and  right. 
Through  life,  through  death,  to  fight  fair  freedom's  fight." 

Tom  Kane  was  laid  up  to  recover,  on  leave  of  absence,  at  Green- 
wood, his  aunt,  Mrs.  Ann  Thomas'  place,  below  Philadelphia  on  the 
banks  of  the  Delaware,  and  thither  I  went  to  visit  him,  Bessie,  and 
Mrs.  Thomas,  from  June  27  till  30.  He  used  to  be  carried  up  and 
down  stairs  in  the  arms  of  his  faithful  colored  man,  Scipio  Young, 
a  "  contraband  "  whom  he  had  found  in  the  South,  and  who,  with 
his  wife  and  family,  settled  at  Kane's,  and  are  there  to  this  day, 
August  3,  1892. 


CHAPTER  XXIV. 

I  ENTER  THE  BRITISH  AND  AMERICAN  EXCHANGE  BANKING  COR- 
PORATION, LIMITED,  AS  MANAGER,  AUGUST  24,  1863 — QUESTION 
OF  THE  CHANGE  OF  NAME  OF  THE  "  DUTCH  REFORMED  "  CHURCH 
DEBATED. 

On  June  3,  1863,  my  eldest  daughter,  Charlotte  Matilda,  mar- 
ried, at  Clifton,  near  Bristol,  the  Rev.  Edward  Bell,  then  curate 
of  Gainsford,  and  subsequently  vicar  of  St.  John's,  Wakefield, 
Yorkshire,  England. 

In  the  summer  of  1S63  we  took  Scribner's  house  at  Yonkers,  and 
while  there  one  of  the  events  of  my  life,  which  I  have  most  clearly 
recognized  as  providential,  happened.  At  that  time  the  Oriental 
Bank  of  London  was  the  greatest  banking  institution  in  the  East 
India  and  China  trade,  and  was  under  the  management  in  London 
of  a  Scotsman  named  Harry  George  Gordon. 

The  bank  had  inspectors  whose  duty  it  was  to  visit  all  the  sub- 
sidiary banks  in  the  East  Indies  and  China.  Two  of  these  inspec- 
tors— one  a  Scotsman  named  John  Skinner,  the  other  an  English- 
man, William  McLay  Elles — came  out  here  in  the  summer  of  1863 
to  establish  a  limited  bank  in  New  York.  It  was  to  be  an  adjunct 
to  the  Oriental  Bank  of  London,  and  was  to  be  called  "  The  British 
and  American  Exchange  Banking  Corporation,  Limited."  It  was 
to  have  an  authorized  capital  of  ^^t, 000, 000  and  a  paid-up  capital 
of  $3,750,000,  and  the  power  of  calling  for  ^250,000  sterling 
more,  if  thought  necessary  by  the  directors.  The  two  inspectors 
were  to  find  a  Scotsman  here  to  manage  the  bank.  They  applied 
to  me.  Whether  they  had  been  recommended  to  do  so  before  their 
arrival  in  New  York  I  know  not.  The  first  notice  of  their  intention 
I  had  from  my  nephew,  John  Walter  Cross,  who  was  then  a  partner 
of  Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co.  here.  I  had  several  notes  from  him 
on  the  subject,  written  from  Wall  Street,  as  I  was  living  for  the  sum- 
mer at  Yonkers  and  out  of  the  way  of  hearing  business  gossip.  I 
intended  to  embody  these  notes  in   my   autobiography,  but  have 

347 


348  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD, 

put  them  away  so  carefully  that  I  cannot  find  them.  The  gist 
of  them,  however,  was  that  if  I  would  accept  the  position  Messrs. 
Skinner  and  EUes  were  empowered  to  offer,  I  should  have  a  salary 
of  four  thousand  pounds  per  annum  and  an  engagement  for  five 
years. 

I  took  this  liberal  offer  into  serious  consideration,  and  had  intimated 
to  Foster  &  Thomson,  my  lawyers,  that  if  I  accepted  I  would  make 
them  solicitors  to  the  new  bank.  I  think  before  deciding  on  the 
subject  I  went  to  see  Dr.  Weir  Mitchell  in  Philadelphia,  as  he  was 
one  of  the  physicians  who  attended  me  there  in  1857.  He  assured 
me  that  he  thought  my  health  was  so  completely  restored  that  I 
might  safely  undertake  the  managership  of  the  banking  corporation 
above  referred  to,  but  I  had  misgivings,  thinking  I  was  too  old, 
although  I  would  not  have  been  fifty-five  until  the  following  Octo- 
ber 21,  1863,  and  I  declined  the  offer.  This  must  have  been  early 
in  June,  1863,  for  I  have  the  following  letter  from  my  uncle,  John 
Dennistoun,  dated  Armadale,  June  26,  1863  : 

"  My  Dear  William  : 

"  If  possible,'!  respect  you  more  than  ever.  Seriously  speaking, 
I  do  think  you  deserve  the  most  unbounded  credit  for  resisting  such 
a  tempting  offer.  At  the  same  time  I  am  clearly  of  opinion  that 
you  acted  wisely  in  declining  it. 

"  On  the  one  hand,  you  had  undoubtedly  a  splendid  income,  and 
that,  too,  in  return  for  what  at  one  time  at  least  would  have  been  '  a 
labor  of  love';  but,  on  the  other  hand,  I  have  a  strong  impression 
that  the  remark  the  '  old  gentleman  '  [Uncle  Alick,  W.  W.]  made  on 
seeing  the  plan  of  a  grand  new  mansion  I  got  for  this  place  some 
seven  or  eight  years  ago  :  '  Well,  if  John  build  a  house  like  that,  he'll 
never  know  comfort  again,'  would  have  been  equally  applicable  to 
you  had  you  undertaken  the  great  responsibility.  Strange  as  it  may 
seem,  the  above  quiet  remark  actually  was  the  cause  of  my  not 
building,  and,  as  I  have  never  ceased  to  congratulate  myself  thereon, 
I  comfort  myself  with  the  reflection  that  if  you  had  gone  into  it  you 
would  probably  '  never  have  known  comfort  again,'  and  therefore  I 
am  glad  that  you  have  had  courage  to  resist  what  to  you  must  have 
been  so  great  a  temptation. 

"  You   have   this   further   satisfaction,  that  you  have  nobly  done 


BRITISH    AND    AMERICAN   BANKING   CORPORATION.      349 

your  duty  to  tlie  company  by  not  undertaking  what  you  had  the 
shadow  of  a  doubt  of  not  being  able  to  accomplish  to  your  own 
satisfaction  ;  and,  moreover,  it  must  ever  be  a  great  consolation 
that  acute,  far-seeing  men  of  business  should  still  value  your  mer- 
cantile services  at  four  thousand  pounds  per  annum  !  Upon  my 
word,  the  very  look  is  tempting,  and  almost  induces  us  'ourself  '  to 
buckle  on  our  armor  and  enter  the  field  as  competitor  for  such  a 
prize.  I  am  glad  you  find  my  photograph  so  absurdly  old  looking. 
The  fact  is,  if  the  artist  had  taken  me  as  I  appeared,  Connie  feared 
that  we  should  have  been  taken  for  brother  and  sister,  and  to  please 
her  he  undertook  to  add  a  dozen  years  or  so  to  me  ;  but  he  overdid 
it,  and  added  at  least  a  quarter  of  a  century  to  my  appearance. 
This  is  a  positive  fact,  as  anyone  that  sees  me  will  vouch.  In  fact, 
beautiful  as  I  was  when  at  New  York  and  in  your  mind's  eye,  I  am, 
if  possible,  beautifuller  now,  and  it  will  be  a  comfort  to  you  to  hear 
that,  so  far  as  a  feeling  of  health  and  strength  are  concerned,  I  am 
really  younger  than  I  was  ten  years  ago. 

"  Poor  old  gentleman  !  dear  James  I  mean,  I  am  grieved  to  hear 
that  he  is  again  an  invalid.  I  had  always  understood  that  he  had 
latterly  got  rid  of  his  ailings,  except  indeed  that  one  complaint 
which  you  and  he  suffer  from  in  common — old  age. 

"  You  will  also  be  pleased  to  hear  that  one  other  dear  old  gentle- 
man continues  as  young  and  rosy  as  ever,  and,  as  for  eating,  I'll 
back  him  to  eat  as  much  fish  alone  at  one  sitting  as  I  could  do 
of  everything  in  a  week.  This  is  a  fact.  I  say  nothing  of  the  war. 
We  are  all  on  this  side  completely  sick  of  the  eternal  skirmishing 
and  no  result. 

"  I  got  the  paper  with  the  announcement  of  the  wedding  all 
right,  altered  indeed,  but  amended. 

"  Ever  yours, 

"John  Dennistoun." 

The  day  after  I  had  declined  the  offer  of  the  four  thousand  pounds 
salary  I  had  a  bilious  headache,  with  network  before  my  eyes,  and 
thought  I  would  call  on  Dr.  Fordyce  Barker  and  ask  him  what  was 
the  cause  of  the  apparent  network  when  I  had  these  bilious  head- 
aches. When  I  reached  his  house  the  headache  was  'gone,  and  I 
found  that  it  was  not  his  hour  for  seeing  patients,  and  I  should  have 


350  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

to  wait  half  an  hoar  ;  so  I  left  the  house,  as  I  could  not  be  bothered 
waiting.  But  after  walking  a  little  something  impelled  me  to  turn 
back  and  wait  the  doctor's  arrival,  and  it  was  well  for  me  and  mine 
that  I  did.  I  told  him,  among  other  things,  of  the  splendid  offer 
that  I  had  had,  and  he  exclaimed  :  "  Oh,  Mr.  Wood  !  why  did  you 
not  consult  me  before  refusing  it  ?  I  have  devoted  a  great  deal 
of  time  to  the  study  of  the  hygiene  of  business  men,  and  I  am  so 
sure  that  the  work  would  have  prolonged  your  life,  as  you  have  for 
so  many  years  led  such  an  active  one,  that  I  would  almost  have 
advised  you  to  take  the  work  without  any  salary."  Dr.  Barker's 
opinion,  so  forcibly  expressed,  made  me  think  that  I  had  acted  like 
a  fool,  and  so  I  went  home  and  wrote  to  Foster  &  Thomson,  giving 
them  the  gist  of  Dr.  Barker's  opinion,  as  I  knew  that  they  had  been 
much  disappointed  at  my  refusal,  as  it,  of  course,  cut  them  out  of 
the  solicitorship,  and  stating  to  the  effect  that  I  would  be  Avilling  to 
reconsider  the  offer,  if  Messrs.  Elles  and  Skinner  had  not  found 
some  other  suitable  person.  Next  morning  I  received  a  letter  from 
Foster  &  Thomson,  saying  that  the  gentlemen  were  quite  at  their 
wits'  end  as  to  finding  the  sort  of  person  they  wanted,  and  would  be 
delighted  to  see  me,  if  I  would  appoint  a  time  to  meet  them.  I 
wrote  to  Foster  &  Thomson,  asking  them  to  state  to  the  two  gentle- 
men that  I  would  be  happy  to  see  them  next  day  at  ii  A.  M.  in 
my  library.  Well,  the  next  day  they  came,  and  I  said  to  them, 
if  I  had  been  speaking  about  another  person,  I  would  have  advised 
them  to  have  nothing  to  do  with  a  man  who  could  entirely  change 
his  mind  on  such  an  important  matter  within  twenty-four  hours. 
I  then  told  them  of  the  conversation  I  had  had  with  Dr.  Barker 
and  the  reason  of  my  change.  They  expressed  themselves  as  much 
pleased.  I  told  them  further  that  I  would  not  take  four  thousand 
pounds  per  annum,  but  only  three  thousand  pounds,  but  with  this 
decrease  of  salary  I  should  expect  only  to  work  from  lo  a.  m.  till  3 
p.  M.;  that  I  should  have  no  directors,  and  that  they  must  entrust 
me  with  the  sole  management  of  the  bank  or  not  at  all  ;  that  in 
addition  to  a  Mr.  John  Gallop,  whom  they  wanted  to  have  as  assist- 
ant manager,  I  was  to  have  my  nephew  John  Walter  Cross  as  second 
assistant  manager,  all  of  which  they  agreed  to. 

I  further  told  them  that  I  thought  they  had  made  a  great  mistake 
in  the  organization  of  the  bank  in  having  a  body  of  Liverpool  direc- 


BRITISH   AND    AMERICAN    BANKING    CORPORATION.      35 1 

tors  in  addition  to  the  London  directors,  that  I  had  lived  twelve 
years  in  Liverpool  and  knew  that  the  Liverpool  men  looked  on  the 
Londoners  as  a  set  of  old  fogies  ;  while  the  Londoners  regarded  the 
former  as  a  set  of  gamblers  and  speculators,  and  that  the  two  sets  of 
directors  would  be  sure  to  quarrel.  The  two  agents  said  I  need  not 
bother  myself  on  that  subject,  as  it  had  been  arranged  within  a  year 
to  get  rid  of  the  Liverpool  directors  and  concentrate  all  tlie  power 
in  London. 

I  asked  Messrs.  Ellis  and  Skinner  to  dine  with  me  here  the  next 
day,  and  had  J.  W.  Cross  to  meet  them,  and  possibly  Gallop,  but 
I  don't  recollect.  My  wife  Margaret  presided  at  table,  looking 
very  handsome.  I  then  proceeded  to  find  a  suitable  ofifice  in  Wall 
Street,  and  clerks.  Harriet's  nephew,  John  Hone,  managed  a  fire 
insurance  office  at  6;^  Wall  Street,  and  although  the  premises  were 
not  large,  they  were  in  a  good  situation  and  next  door  to  Brown 
Brothers  &  Co.,  and  I  arranged  with  John  Hone  to  vacate  the  premi- 
ses and  make  over  the  lease  to  me,  which  he  did.  I  had  bills  of 
exchange  forms  engraved  and  all  the  other  paraphernalia  of  a  bank- 
ing business.  Having  completed  all  the  preliminary  arrangements 
on  August  24,  1863,  we  issued  our  advertisement  and  commenced 
business,  having  opened  an  account  with  the  Bank  of  America,  which 
was  one  of  the  most  conservative  banks  in  New  York.  I  thought 
it  desirable  that  our  new  and  foreign  bank  should  be  connected  with 
it,  as  ours  was  the  first  established  under  what  was  called  the  Limited 
Liabilities  Act  of  1862,  and  therefore  involving  a  new  principle  in 
banking,  and  the  more  conservative  our  financial  relations  with  Wall 
Street  were  the  better  for  the  credit  of  the  new  bank. 

I  wrote  again  to  my  uncle  John  Dennistoun,  telling  him  of  my 
entire  change  of  plans  and  my  reason  therefor,  and  received  in 
reply  a  letter  from  him  dated  London,  July  4,  1863,  of  which  the  fol- 
lowing is  a  copy  : 

"  My  Dear  William  : 

"  Since  I  wrote  you  last,  a  week  ago,  I  have  received  your  second 
dispatch  announcing  a  total  change  in  your  plans.  I  can  only  say 
that  this  new  light  brought  to  bear  upon  it  by  your  doctor,  and  the 
modified  work  required  of  you,  entirely  change  the  state  of  matters, 
and  I  think  you  acted  wisely  and  were  quite  justified  in  accepting  the 


352  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

offer.  That  you  may  continue  to  have  a  pleasant  as  well  as  profit- 
able employment  in  your  new  berth,  is  my  sincere  prayer.  Now, 
my  dear  William,  I  am  only  going  to  give  you  one  piece  of  advice, 
and  I  know  coming  from  me  you  will  listen  to  it,  and  I  trust  «<;/ upon 
it  also — namely,  don't  attempt  to  do  everything  yourself,  but  see  as 
much  as  you  like  that  others  do  it,  and  above  and  beyond  all,  take 
ikitigs  easy.  Life  is  far  too  short  to  be  made  miserable,  and  yours 
is  too  important  to  your  family  to  be  played  with,  therefore,  let 
exchange  rise,  or  let  exchange  fall,  take  all  thmgs  easy.  What  a  grand 
opening  too  for  Johnnie  Cross  I  We  are  grieved  very  much  to  part 
with  him,  but  we  would  not  hesitate  about  advising  him  to  accept  it. 
I  wonder  what  poor  old  Cross  would  say  if  he  only  knew  what  turn 
things  had  taken  !  You  and  his  son  at  the  head  of  a  rival  establish- 
ment, as  it  were,  of  the  old  house — sweetened  as  the  knowledge 
would  be  that  you  were  both  in  receipt  of  such  splendid  salaries  ! 

"  I  am  going  hence  to  Brighton  this  afternoon  and  shall  hear  what 
the  old  lady  says. 

"  Ever,  my  dear  William, 

"  Yours  very  sincerely, 

"  Jno.  D." 

The  preliminary  arrangements  for  starting  the  bank  took  some 
time,  and  I  did  not  put  it  in  actual  operation  until  August  24,  1863. 
On  which  day  our  business  began  with  a  rush  of  customers,  and  I 
had  no  idea  until  then  how  popular  I  was  in  the  Wall  Street  of  that 
day.  I  had  retired  from  the  house  of  Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co.,  on 
December  31,  i860,  and  during  the  intervening  two  years  and  eight 
months  had  only  been  occasionally  down  in  Wall  Street,  but  many 
of  my  old  customers  and  many  new  ones  came  flocking  about  me, 
and  I  was  in  good  health  and  excellent  spirits.  I  insert  here  our 
advertisement  of  August  24,  1863,  making  it  part  of  this  autobiog- 
raphy : 


BRITISH   AND   AMERICAN   BANKING  CORPORATION.       353 

THE 

BRITISH  AND  AMERICAN 

EXCHANGE  BANKING  CORPORATION, 


Established  under  the  Companies'  Act,  1862,  with  limited  liability. 

Authorized  capital,  ONE  MILLION  STERLING. 

In  20,000  shares  of  ^^50  each, 

Already  issued,  15,000  shares  of  £^0  each. 


DIRECTORS  : 
Chairman,  Harry  George  Gordon,  Esq.,  Chairman  of  the  Oriental  Bank  Cor- 
poration, London. 
Deputy  Chairman  in  London,  Robert  Gillespie,  Jr.,  Esq.,  of  the  firm  of 
Gillespies,  Moffatt  &  Co.,  London. 
Deputy  Chairman  in  Liverpool,  Harold  Littleda'.e,   Esq.,  of  the  firm  of  T.  &  H. 
Littledale  &  Co.,  Liverpool. 


Archibald  Boyd,  Esq.,  Director  of  the 
Union  Bank,  London. 

William  James  Fernie,  Esq.,  of  the  firm 
of  Fernie  Brothers  &  Co.,  Liverpool. 

John  Gilchrist,  Esq. ,  of  the  firm  of  Gil- 
christ, Watt  &  Co.,  of  Sydney,  direc- 
tor of  the  Union  Bank  of  London, 
London. 


Wm.  M.  Neill,  Esq.,  of  the  firm  of 
Neill  Brothers  &  Co.,  Manchester. 

John  Pender,  Esq.,  M.  P.,  Manches- 
ter. 

Thos.  Rees,  Esq.,  of  the  firm  of  Wood- 
ward, Rees  &  Co.,  Liverpool. 

William  Rennie,  Esq.,  of  the  firm  of 
Cavan,  Lubbock  &  Co.,  London. 


Samuel  Stitt,  Esq.,  of  the  late  firm  of  Stitt  Brothers  &  Co.,  Liverpool. 


London  :  Manager,  John  Skinner,  Esq.,  succeeded  by  Samuel  Gray,  Esq. 
Liverpool :  Manager,  Wm.  Williamson,  Esq. 


IN  NEW    YORK  : 

William  Wood,  Esq.,  Manager  ;      John  Gallop,  Esq.,  Assistant  Manager  ; 

J.  W.  Cross,  Esq. ,  Second  Assistant  Manager. 

Commercial  Agents,  Messrs.  Howland  &  Aspinwall. 


BANKERS : 
London  :    The    Union    Bank     of    Lon-    |    Manchester  :    The  Bank  of  England. 

don.  I    India  and  China  :  The  Oriental  Bank 

Liverpool  :  The  Bank  of  England.  '        Corporation. 

New  York  :  The  Bank  of  America, 
solicitors  ; 
London  :  Messrs.  Cotterill  &  Sons.         |        Liverpool :  Messrs.  Fletcher  &  Hull. 
New  York  :  Messrs.  Foster  &  Thomson, 


354  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

THE  BRITISH  AND  AMERICAN  EXCHANGE  BANKING 
CORPORATION, 

LIMITED, 

Having  opened  offices  at  63  Wall  Street,  New  York,  is  prepared  to  sell  and  buy 
sterling  bills  of  exchange,  and  to  issue  commercial  and  travelers'  credits,  available 
in  all  parts  of  the  world.  Commercial  credits  issued  for  use  in  the  East  Indies, 
China,  and  Australia,  will  be  upon  the  Oriental  Bank  Corporation  of  London. 

Further  particulars  may  be  ascertained  on  application  at  the  office,  63  Wall  Street. 

William  Wood,  Manager. 

Newt  York,  August  24,  1863. 

We  entered  at  once  upon  a  large  and  flourishing  business,  to  man- 
age which  I  came  down  from  Yonkers  every  day,  but  continued  to 
live  there  with  my  wife  and  children  till  September.  I  began  the 
following  sonnet  to  the  Hudson  at  Yonkers,  and  finished  it  there 
August  18,  1863  : 

"  Majestic  Hudson  !  noble  stream  ! 
Slow  wending  to  the  boundless  main. 
What  glorious  scenes  thy  rocky  cliffs 
Thy  quiet  coves  and  wooded  heights  contain  ! 
From  Yonkers'  hills  the  Tappaan  Zee 
Behold,  with  mountains  circled  round. 
Specked  on  these  sweet  autumnal  days 
With  white  sails  on  its  azure  bays, 
Sped  by  the  west  wind  on  their  way. 

Southward  where  Staten's  lovely  isle  the  beauteous  prospect  bounds. 
And  the  red  convent  towers  are  seen 
Contrasting  with  the  foliage  green, 
And  with  the  Palisades  so  grand  and  gray, 
Whicli  since  'light  was  '  have  overhung  thy  many  twinkling  way." 

To  return  to  "  our  mutton,"  the  business  of  the  bank  went  on 
swimmingly  all  the  rest  of  1863,  and  of  course  I  was  in  excellent 
health  and  spirits.  Whatever  part  of  my  salary  I  did  not  require  for 
living  expenses  I  invested  in  United  States  six  per  cent,  gold  bonds  at 
the  price  of  the  day.  This  continued  in  the  same  agreeable  way  dur- 
ing the  spring  of  1864,  and  for  the  summer  of  the  year  I  hired 
Foote's  house  at  Yonkers,  coming  in  every  day  to  attend  to  business. 

George  Burghall  Watts,  a  young  widower,  whose  father  and  grand- 
father were  respectively  British  vice-consul  and  consul  at  Carthagena, 
South  America,  after  courting  my  youngest  daughter  Helen  for  some 


CHANGE    OF   CHURCH    NAME    DEBATED.  355 

time,  was  married  to  her  April  25,  1864,  and  after  John  W.  Cross 
went  home,  he  was  with  me  in  the  British  and  American  Bank  for 
upward  of  a  year,  when  he  left  and  went  into  partnership  with  Wil- 
Ham  Redmond,  Jr. 

Matters  continued  much  the  same  in  1865,  and  that  summer  I 
spent  at  Rich's  house  near  the  station  at  Yonkers.  The  British  and 
American  Banking  and  Exchange  Corporation,  Limited,  continued 
to  do  an  excellent  business,  but  about  this  time  there  was  a  change 
made  from  that  designation  to  that  of  "  The  English  and  American 
Bank,  Limited."  Having  sent  all  the  papers  relating  to  the  bank 
over  to  London  when  it  was  closed  in  1868,  I  have  no  documentary 
evidence  as  to  the  time  and  reason  for  the  change  of  name,  and  I 
have  not  the  faintest  recollection,  but  I  do  recollect  that  for  some 
four  months  during  the  time  that  the  new  organization  was  being 
effected  we  did  no  business,  and  during  that  time  I  had  new  bills, 
forms,  and  documents  engraved,  and  when  we  resumed  business  we 
seem  to  have  had  the  same  directors  in  London  and  Liverpool.  On 
March  9,  1867,  the  Money  Market  Review  gives  a  report  of  what  it 
calls  the  second  ordinary  meeting  of  "  The  English  and  American 
Bank,  Limited,"  Mr.  William  Schofield,  M.  P.  for  Birmingham,  in 
the  chair,  at  the  London  Tavern,  London,  in  place  of  Harry  George 
Gordon,  the  regular  chairman,  who  was  sick  and  confined  to  bed. 
Mr.  Schofield,  in  speaking  at  the  close  of  the  meeting,  paid  me  the 
following  compliment  :  He  "  moved  the  thanks  of  the  meeting  to 
the  managers  and  secretary  at  London,  New  York,  and  Liverpool, 
and  that  these  thanks  applied  still  more  emphatically  to  Mr.  Wood, 
their  excellent  manager  at  New  York.  Everyone  connected  with 
mercantile  matters  in  New  York  knew  the  high  reputation  which  Mr. 
Wood  enjoyed,  not  only  in  that  country,  but  also  in  this,  and  when 
he,  the  chairman,  said  that  Mr.  Wood's  services  to  the  bank  justified 
the  reputation  he  enjoyed  among  Americans  and  Englishmen,  he 
probably  had  spoken  the  highest  praise  he  could  on  behalf  of  that 
gentleman.     (Cheers)." 

In  the  early  part  of  1867  there  was  a  strong  effort  made  by  a  cer- 
tain Rev.  Dr.  Ganse,  who  had  the  editorship  of  the  Chrisiiaii  Intel- 
ligencer, the  organ  of  the  Reformed  Protestant  Dutch  Church  of 
America,  to  strike  out  the  word  "  Dutch  "  from  our  denomination, 
leaving  only  the  very  indefinite  and  silly  designation  of  "  Reformed 


356  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Church,"  whicli  applies  to  many  other  Protestant  Christian  churches 
in  the  United  States.  This  man,  Ganse,  not  only  traitorously  turned 
our  own  newspaper  organ  against  us,  but  actually  signed  the  name  of 
Dr.  De  Witt  to  a  petition  to  Classis  to  have  the  word  "  Dutch  " 
stricken  out  from  our  designation,  and  that  without  any  authority 
from  Dr.  De  Witt.  This  attempt  roused  my  just  indignation,  for  my 
sympathies  were  with  the  Dutch,  remembering  how  kind  they  were 
to  us  Scottish  Presbyterians  in  the  persecuting  and  killing  times  of 
Charles  II.  and  James  II.  Between  that  era  and  myself  there  is  only 
one  life,  for  my  grandaunt,  Miss  Ann  Wood,  whom  I  knew  well, 
was  born  in  1730,  when  many  people  born  in  the  time  of  Charles 
II.  must  have  been  alive.  I  had  forgotten  many  of  the  circum- 
stances of  the  meeting  of  the  New  York  Classis  of  the  Dutch 
Church  in  1867,  but  in  my  scrap-book,  by  accident  came  across  a 
report  of  it  for  the  New  York  Times  of  October  15,  1867,  which  I 
think  it  worth  while  to  copy  : 

THE   REFORMED    DUTCH   CHURCH. — MEETING   OF   THE   NEW   YORK 
CLASSIS. — PROPOSED    CHANGE   OF   NAME. 

"  The  regular  meeting  of  the  New  York  Classis  of  the  Reformed 
Dutch  Church  was  held  in  the  consistory  of  the  North  Dutch  Church 
in  Fulton  Street  yesterday,  Rev.  Dr.  De  Witt  in  the  chair.  The 
subject  of  the  change  of  name  was  taken  up  and  disposed  of  after  a 
very  animated  debate. 

"  Mr.  Wood,  a  member  of  the  consistory  of  the  Collegiate  Church, 
made  the  opening  speech,  taking  ground  in  favor  of  retaining  the 
old  name  of  '  Dutch.'  He  assailed  the  report  of  the  committee  of 
the  General  Synod  on  the  subject  of  the  change  of  name,  and  by 
criticism  upon  the  manner  of  the  signing  of  the  report  by  the  mem- 
bers of  the  committee,  rendered  an  explanation  on  the  part  of  the 
Rev.  Dr.  De  Witt,  and  Rev.  Dr.  Ganse,  chairman  of  the  committee, 
necessary. 

"  Rev.  Dr.  Ganse  defended  himself  from  the  attack  upon  himself 
as  chairman  of  the  committee,  by  stating  that  he  received  from  Dr. 
De  Witt  what  he  remembered  as  very  definite  and  explicit  per- 
mission to  append  his  name  to  the  report,  although  Dr.  De  AVitt 
might  have  in  some  way  misapprehended  the  question  at  the  time  his 
name  was  obtained. 


changp:  of  church  name  debatp:d.      357 

"  Dr.  De  Witt  said  there  was  some  difference  of  opinion  between 
him  and  Rev.  Dr.  Ganse  on  that  point  which  he  had  endeavored  to 
explain  in  the  note  which  he  had  sent  to  the  Synod.  It  certainly 
approved  of  the  spirit  of  the  report,  and  of  its  proposition,  too,  pro- 
vided it  was  deemed  necessary,  and  the  change  could  be  made  with- 
out involving  a  violation  of  the  constitution  of  the  Church. 

"The  Rev.  Dr.  Vermilye  made  along  speech  against  the  change, 
taking  the  ground  that  the  General  Synod  had  no  right  to  propose 
the  change  of  the  name,  as  it  existed  before  the  church  was  organ- 
ized, and  no  provision  was  made  in  the  constitution  authorizing  it 
to  take  action  on  such  a  subject.  The  doctor  was  exceedingly 
severe  in  his  strictures  on  the  Christian  Intelligeiicer,  and  charged 
that  its  columns  had  been  used  exclusively  in  the  interest  of  those 
who  proposed  the  change  of  name.  He  also  accused  it  of  dealing 
with  the  names  of  certain  gentlemen  in  a  scurrilous  manner,  and 
repudiated  it  as  an  organ  of  the  Reformed  Dutch  Church. 

"  Rev.  Dr.  Duryea  made  a  long  and  eloquent  speech,  in  the  course 
of  which  he  took  the  ground  that  if  there  was  vitality  in  the  church 
retaining  the  name  would  not  kill  it  ;  if,  however,  the  change  of 
name  would  give  an  impetus  to  the  church, — and  he  thought  the 
impetus  was  needed, — then  he  was  heartily  in  favor  of  the  change. 
He  did  not  regard  that  as  one  of  the  essentials  of  church  machinery, 
but  what  was  essential  and  necessary  was  a  revival  of  the  zeal  of  the 
Dutch  Church  or  baptism  of  the  spirit,  a  more  spontaneous  liberality 
in  response  to  the  claims  of  the  various  departments  of  church  work. 
If  these  things  did  not  take  place,  he  did  not  see  what  could  save 
them  from  absorption  in  other  bodies. 

"  Dr.  Stryker  spoke  against  the  change. 

"  Rev.  Dr.  Ganse  spoke  in  favor  of  it.  He  said  that  the  Scotch- 
Irish  had  become  the  plain  Presbyterian  Church.  The  Church  of 
England  had  become  the  Episcopal  Church,  and  the  German  Lutheran 
and  other  bodies  had  simplified  their  names,  and  had  benefited  by 
doing  so.  He  said  that  the  name  "  Dutch"  was  a  great  impediment 
to  the  work  of  the  church. 

"  Rev.  Dr.  De  Witt,  after  long  and  prayerful  consideration,  had 
decided  it  his  duty  to  stand  by  the  old  name. 

"  Rev.  Dr.  Rogers  said  he  cared  nothing  for  the  name,  neither  did 
his  church,  but  they  were  in  favor  of  what  they  believed  would  tend 


358  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

to  spread  the  Gospel  most  successfully,  hence  they  were  in  favor  of 
the  change  because  they  thought  progress  lay  in  that  direction. 

"  Chancellor  Ferris  made  a  long  and  interesting  historical  address, 
giving  his  adhesion  to  the  proposition  in  favor  of  the  change  of 
name. 

"  The  Rev  Dr.  Forsyth  saw  no  reason  for  changing  the  name, 
because,  after  all,  he  could  not  see  what  way  it  was  to  be  abandoned. 
It  could  not  be  done  without  cutting  the  church  loose  from  its 
history,  and  who  wanted  to  do  that  ? 

"  The  vote  on  the  motion  that  the  Classis  assent  to  the  proposition, 
submitted  by  the  General  Synod,  to  the  change  of  name  from 
Reformed  Dutch  Cluirch  to  Reformed  Church,  was  then  taken  with 
the  following  result  :  Yeas,  i8  ;  nays,  26.  The  motion  was  declared 
lost. 

■'  Mr.  Wood  (elder)  then  moved  the  following  resolution  : 

"  '  Resolved,  That  this  Classis  repudiate  the  action  of  the  General 
Synod,  in  so  far  as  it  tends  to  abolish  that  ''worthy  name,"  by  which 
we  have  been  denominated  for  so  many  generations,  as  being 
uncalled  for,  unnecessary,  and  not  tending  to  promote  the  welfare 
of  the  church,  and  that  we  will  endeavor  by  every  Christian  and 
legal  means  to  maintain  our  existing  name  as  the  Reformed 
Protestant  Dutch  Church,  the  designation  which  Avas  first  legally 
bestowed  upon  us  by  William  IIL  of  England,  the  bulwark  of  the 
Protestant  faith,  who  was  Prince  of  Orange  and  Stadtholder  of  the 
Netherlands  before  he  was  King  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  and 
has  ever  been  esteemed  one  of  the  greatest  statesmen  of  his  own  or 
of  any  other  age,  and  who  was  at  every  period  of  his  eventful  life  a 
true-hearted  Dutchman.' 

"  This  resolution  was  lost  by  a  vote  of  23  nays,  against  8  yeas. 

"  The  Rev.  Dr.  Vermilye  moved  the  following  : 

'"  Whereas,  The  constitution  of  the  Reformed  Protestant  Dutch 
Church  was  made  by  a  body  already  existing  for  its  government  ; 
and 

"  '  Whereas,  Neither  the  body  nor  the  name  was  the  creation  of 
the  General  Synod,  but  the  reverse  is  the  fact ;  and 

"  '  Whereas,  The  constitution  gives  authority  to  the  General  Synod 
to  carry  on  the  specific  provisions  of  the  constitution  for  the  gov- 
ernment of  th-  church;  but   not   to  alter  its  title  or  to  change   its 


CHANGE    OF   CHURCH    NAME    DEBATED.  359 

form  of  government  ;  and  we  do  respectfully  and  solemnly  object 
to  the  assumption  or  exercise  of  any  such  power.' 

"  Dr.  Vermilye's  preamble  and  resolutions  were  adopted  by  a  vote 
of  thirteen  yeas  to  eleven  nays. 

"Rev.  Dr.  De  Witt  and  other  members  of  the  Classis  declined  to 
vote  on  the  last  motion,  because  they  considered  that  the  matter 
was  pressed  upon  them  before  they  had  time  to  consider  properly. 
The  Classis  then  adjourned." 

[Twenty-six  years  afterward  (1893),  1  consider  that  my  motion 
was  the  better  of  the  two,  and  that  with  regard  to  Dr.  Vermilye's, 
that  dear  old  Dr.  De  Witt  and  his  co-mates  had  had  ample  time  to 
think.— W.  W.] 


CHAPTER   XXV. 

I  WIND  UP  THE  AFFAIRS  OF  THE  BANK  AND  END  MY  COMMERCIAL 
LIFE — I  BEGIN  A  NEW  CAREER  OF  WORK  IN  THE  BOARD  OF 
EDUCATION,    GIVING    MY    LIFE's    SERVICES    TO    MY    ADOPTED     CITY. 

I  FEEL  very  much  inclined  to  embody  in  this  "auto"  an  article 
on  the  Scottish  jury  system  which  I  wrote  for  the  Scottish- American, 
July  20,  1867,  and  many  free  trade  articles  for  the  Evening  Post 
and  New  York  Times.  I  may  briefly  recur  to  these  afterward,  but 
meanwhile  will  go  on  and  finish  the  account  of  my  connection  with 
The  English  and  American  Bank,  Limited. 

About  the  middle  of  1867  I  found  that  our  business  was  increas- 
ing so  fast  that  to  do  it  justice  the  cash  capital  of  the  bank  ought 
to  be  increased  by  a  call  on  the  reserve,  and  wrote  to  that  effect  to 
the  head  office,  London.  The  year  1867  had  been  a  disastrous  one 
in  English  business,  and  the  Liverpool  merchants  had  been  hit 
pretty  hard,  so  that  many  of  the  Liverpool  stockholders  of  the 
bank  were  unwilling  to  pay  up  any  further  calls,  and  this  led  to  an 
extraordinary  general  meeting  of  the  shareholders.  It  was  held  at 
the  London  office  of  the  company,  No.  40  Threadneedle  Street,  on 
October  31,  1867,  for  the  confirmation  of  the  following  resolutions, 
passed  at  the  meeting  held  on  October  16,  to  wit:  "  That  The 
English  and  American  Bank,  Limited,  is  required  to  be  wound  up 
voluntarily  ;  that  the  directors  of  the  company,  together  with  the 
manager,  be  appointed  liquidators  of  the  company  ;  that  the  remu- 
neration of  the  liquidators  be  the  sum  of  three  thousand  pounds 
sterling  (afterward  raised  to  four  thousand  pounds);  that  the  liquida- 
tors be  authorized  to  pay  to  any  servant  of  the  company,  by  way  ot 
bonus,  in  addition  to  salary,  any  sum  not  exceeding  one  year's 
salary,  as  the  liquidators  may  think  fit." 

Before  these  resolutions  were  put  to  the  vote,  Mr.  Sam.  Gray,  the 
London  manager,  made  a  very  eloquent  and  logical  speech  in  favor 
of  carrying  on  the  banks,  the  present  condition  and  prospects  of 
which  were  so  good.     He  stated   that,  in  his  opinion,  the  important 

360 


I    END    MY   COMMERCIAL   LIFE.  361 

interests  of  a  third  party  in  the  bank,  in  addition  to  the  directors 
and  stockholders,  had  been  entirely  overlooked,  and  that  was  the 
party  of  the  customers  of  the  bank,  who  had  been  drawn  to  the  bank 
by  a  belief  in  its  continuity  ;  and  in  leaving  their  previous  connec- 
tions, and  coming  to  it,  had  severed  ties  which  it  might  be  very 
difficult  for  them  to  reunite.  However,  all  his  eloquence  and 
appeals  to  justice  were  in  vain.  The  resolutions  were  carried  that 
the  bank  should  be  wound  up,  and  the  meeting  ended  with  a  vote 
of  thanks  to  Mr.  Gray  and  Mr.  Wood  for  "  their  interest  in  and 
able  management  of  the  affairs  of  the  bank." 

As  my  salary  for  five  years  did  not  cease  until  September,  186S, 
I  had  a  pretty  easy  time  of  it  in  simply  winding  up  the  outstanding 
affairs  and  doing  no  new  business.  During  the  five  years  my  three 
thousand  pounds  sterling  per  annum  averaged  \^NtXi\.^''^\y.  thousand 
dollars  per  annum,  and  one  year,  I  think  1864,  it  reached  fifty 
thousand  dollars,  at  that  time  double  the  salary  of  the  President  of 
the  United  States  !  I  invested  everything  I  could  spare  in  United 
States  six  per  cent,  gold  bonds,  and  all  my  losses  by  the  Rebellion 
were  more  than  covered. 

In  September,  1868,  there  were  still  some  outstanding  matters, 
which  I  offered  to  attend  to  for  nothing,  and  did  attend  to  till  April 
30,  1869,  when  the  only  remaining  matters  were  some,  subject  to 
litigation,  which  I  handed  over  to  Messrs.  Foster  &  Thomson,  the 
solicitors  of  the  bank.  The  liquidators  of  the  bank  made  me  a 
present  of  six  thousand  dollars  for  my  extra  services,  and  that 
brought  my  financial  business  life  to  a  conclusion. 

As,  during  the  winding  up  of  the  bank's  business  in  1868-1869,  I 
had  a  good  deal  of  leisure  time,  I  took  an  interest  in  the  cause  of 
free  trade,  and  was  one  of  a  committee  to  provide  a  system  of  by- 
laws for  the  American  Free  Trade  League.  The  chairman  was 
Charles  Astor  Bristed,  a  grandson  of  John  Jacob  Astor,  who  had 
been  educated  at  Oxford  ;  and  our  other  colleague  was  Mr.  Simon 
Stern,  then  a  young  man  of  very  advanced  political  opinions,  and 
now  (1893)  a  leading  railway  lawyer.  He  told  me  that  I  had  no 
idea  of  the  strong  anarchical  feeling  which  existed  among  the  poorer 
classes,  under  the  smooth  surface  of  New  York  society.  This  led 
me  to  consider  what  could  best  be  done  to  cure  this  state  of  matters, 
and  I  arrived  at  the  conclusion  that  the  best  and  safest  cure  was  the 


362  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

thorough  education  of  the  people.  So  I  made  up  my  mind  that, 
ahhough  I  detested  scliools, — my  reminiscences  of  my  own  school- 
boy days  being  by  no  means  agreeable, — yet  it  was  my  duty  to  do 
what  I  could  to  promote  the  education  of  the  people  of  the  city  if  I 
got  any  opening. 

Another  matter  in  which  I  interested  myself  actively  at  the  time 
was  the  raising  of  money  here  for  the  erection  of  the  Wallace  mon- 
ument near  Stirling,  in  Scotland.  I  had  the  satisfaction  of  remit- 
ting to  the  chairman  of  the  fund,  Lord  Jerviswood,  ^^64.2  13s.  2d. 
(Charles  Baillie  of  Jerviswood,  who  was  then  a  judge  of  the  Scottish 
court,  was  about  three  years  older  than  myself.  We  had  been  fel- 
low-students at  St.  Andrew's  in  the  second  and  third  classes  of 
mathematics,  under  Professor  Duncan,  and  both  of  us  took  prizes.) 

I  was  elected  president  of  the  St.  Andrew's  Society  of  the  State  of 
New  York  in  1865,  and  re-elected  in  1866.  But  I  declined  a  further 
re-election,  though  I  have  always  attended  the  annual  dinner,  and 
made  speeches  there  until  1888. 

My  last  official  act  as  chairman  of  the  St.  Andrew's  Society  was  to 
send  the  following  letter  to  the  Duke  of  Argyll  as  chairman  of  the 
Scottish  Hospital,  London  : 

"  No.  4  West  Eighteenth  St.,  New  York, 
"  December  4,  1866. 
"  My  Lord  Duke  : 

*'  Your  cable  dispatch  of  November  30  to  the  following  effect, 
*  To  the  President  of  the  St.  Andrew's  Society,  New  York  :  Friend- 
ship, prosperity,  and  union  forever,'  unfortunately  did  not  come  to 
hand  until  the  evening  of  December  i.  Had  it  reached  me,  as  it 
was  intended  to  do,  at  our  dinner  on  St.  Andrew's  Day,  its  kindly 
tone,  and  the  fact  that  it  emanated  from  the  oldest  Scottish  charita- 
ble society  in  existence,  would  have  added  to  the  very  great  hilarity 
of  the  joyous  evening  which  the  Scotsmen  here  spent  on  St.  An- 
drew's Day.  Under  the  circumstances,  I  have  not  sent  a  reply  by 
cable,  thinking,  like  a  '  canny  Scot,'  that  the  money  would  be  better 
bestowed  upon  the  Scottish  poor  in  New  York. 
"  I  am,  my  Lord  Duke, 

"  Your  Grace's  obedient  servant, 

"  William  Wood, 
"  President  of  the  St.  Andrew's  Society  in  the  State  of  New  York." 


WORK   IN   THE   BOARD    OF    EDUCATION.  363 

On  January  12,  i860,  I  was  elected  an  elder  of  the  Collegiate 
Reformed  Protestant  Dutch  Church.  I  had  been  admitted  to  mem- 
bership June  16,  1858.  I  served  as  an  elder  for  twelve  years  con- 
tinuously, and  was  present  officially  at  the  laying  of  the  corner  stone 
of  the  beautiful  church,  corner  of  Forty-eighth  Street  and  Fifth 
Avenue.  The  architect  was  William  Wheeler  Smith,  son  of  one  of 
our  elders.     I  fought  his  design  tiirough  the  Consistory. 

I  retired  from  the  Consistory  after  my  twelve  years'  service,  in 
1872,  but  was  induced  to  return  two  years  afterward,  and  served  for 
two  more  years.  Owing  to  a  political  intrigue,  more  fitting  for  the 
Sixth  Ward  than  the  Church,  I  was  dropped  in  the  election  of  1876. 
This  took  place  just  as  I  was  made  president  of  the  Board  of  Educa- 
tion. I  had  therefore  decided  to  retire  from  the  eldership,  unless  I 
had  a  very  large  majority.     Instead  of  this,  I  was  left  in  a  minority  ! 

There  are  many  other  things  I  would  like  to  enter  from  my  com- 
monplace book  if  I  had  time  and  space.  Among  them  an  account 
of  the  Milne  School  at  Fochabers,  in  Scotland,  and  of  the  monu- 
ment to  Milne  at  New  Orleans,  described  by  me  in  an  article  in 
The  Scottish  American,  dated  January  12,  1867.  However,  I  leave 
these  and  many  other  matters  unrecorded,  and  come  to  my  unex- 
pected appointment  as  Commissioner  of  Common  Schools,  on  May 
4,  1869,  to  hold  office  until  December  31,  1871.  My  appointment 
was  made  by  Oakey  Hall,  then  Mayor  of  New  York,  and  on  coming 
into  my  house  May  5,  1869,  I  found  an  official  envelope  on  the  hall 
table  enclosing  my  commission.  I  made  up  my  mind  to  accept  the 
nomination,  although  by  no  means  fond  of  schools  or  school-work, 
and  determined  that  I  would  thoroughly  study  out  the  whole  system, 
so  that,  when  I  had  finished  my  researches,  nobody  should  be  able 
to  tell  me  anything  connected  with  the  common  schools  that  I  did 
not  know.  The  Board  of  Education,  under  a  new  law,  passed  in 
1869,  consisted  of  twelve  members,  instead  of  twenty-one,  as  before. 
Those  twelve  were  to  be  nominated  by  the  Mayor,  from  any  part  of 
the  city,  instead  of  being  elected,  as  heretofore,  from  certain  school 
districts  by  ballot.  The  twelve  new  commissioners  were  as  follows  : 
Richard  L.  Larremore,  Timothy  Brennan,  Samuel  A.  Lewis,  William 
E.  Diiryea,  William  Wood,  John  H.  Sherwood,  Nathaniel  Sands 
Magnus  Gross,  Bernard  Smyth,  Lorin  Ingersoll,  Thomas  Murphy 
Isaac  Bell. 


364  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF     WILLIAM    WOOD. 

The  first  four  had  served  on  the  previous  board  ;  the  other  eight 
were  all  new  men,  and  the  only  one  I  had  ever  seen  before  or  knew 
was  Isaac  Bell,  whose  Mobile  house,  I.  Bell  &  Co.,  had  been  the 
agents  of  Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co.  in  Mobile. 

The  first  meeting  of  the  new  board  for  organization  took  place 
May  12,  1869,  when  I  was  elected  president  pro  tern.,  and  held  the 
chair  while  the  voting  for  the  presiding  president  and  other  officers 
was  going  on. 

Richard  L.  Larremore,  afterwards  Judge  Larremore,  was  elected 
president  by  ten  votes.     I  received  one. 

William  Hatchman,  previously  Speaker  of  the  Assembly,  was 
elected  clerk  by  eleven  votes. 

Then  a  lot  of  routine  business  was  transacted,  and  President 
Larremore  named  some  of  the  committees  of  the  board.  I  was  put 
on  the  finance  committee,  and  that  was  tlie  only  committee  I  was 
appointed  on,  strange  to  say,  that  day.  At  the  following  meeting, 
on  January  19,  I  was  appointed  in  addition  on  the  auditing 
committee. 

On  the  appointment  of  this  new  Board  of  Education  the  papers 
gave  notices  of  all  the  different  members.  Those  of  myself  were  all 
very  laudatory.  But  the  neatest  and  most  concise  was  that  of  The 
Scottish  American,  which  was  as  follows  : 

"  APPOINTMENT    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD,    ESQ. 

"  The  new  Board  of  Education  in  this  city,  the  creation  of  which 
has  been  discussed  with  no  little  vehemence  for  the  last  month  or 
two,  held  its  first  meeting  on  the  12th  inst.  [May  12,  1869].  The 
old  board  consisted  of  twenty-one  members,  who  are  now  replaced 
by  twelve,  of  whom  seven  are  Democrats  and  five  are  Republicans. 

"  In  the  selection  of  Mr.  William  Wood  as  a  commissioner  a  just 
appreciation  has  been  shown  of  that  gentleman's  unsurpassed  fitness 
in  every  respect  for  a  position  alike  honorable  and  useful.  Few  of  our 
readers,  at  least  in  this  city,  require  to  be  told  that  Mr.  Wood  is  a 
native  of  Scotland,  and  that  he  has  resided  among  us  for  nearly 
forty  years,  closely  identified  with  all  our  highest  social  and  com- 
mercial interests. 

"  As  the  American  head  of  the  great  banking  house  of  Dennis- 
toun, Wood  &  Co.,  his  name  was  long  the  synonym  for  business  in- 


WORK   IN   THE   BOARD    OF   EDUCATION,  365 

tegrity,  while  the  geniality  of  his  manner  sweetened  and  softened 
his  relations  with  all  who  met  him  amid  the  ceaseless  toils  and 
anxieties  of  financial  and  commercial  intercourse.  We  know  of  no 
man  who  more  thoroughly  exemplifies  the  adage  of  'a  sound  mind 
in  a  sound  body.'  Mr.  Wood  has  retired  from  business  life,  and 
will  be  able  to  devote  all  the  energies  of  his  clear,  active,  and  liberal 
mind  to  the  duties  of  the  post  which  he  has  been  called  to  fill.  So 
keen  a  lover  of  literature,  and  so  competent  a  judge  of  human  char- 
acter, must  prove  an  invaluable  member  of  the  new  Board  of  Edu- 
cation, while  his  stainless  name  is  a  guarantee  to  the  community  that 
the  affairs  of  that  board  will  be  administered  with  justice  and 
purity." 

I  omitted  to  mention  at  the  proper  place  that  my  brother  James, 
after  a  visit  to  us  of  ten  years,  returned  home  to  see  his  relations  on 
the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic.  The  Scottish  American  of  June  13, 
1868,  made  the  following  comment  : 

''''Personal. —  Mr.  James  Dennistoun  Wood,  of  this  city,  sailed  dur- 
ing the  past  week  for  Liverpool,  with  the  intention  of  spending  a 
few  weeks  in  Europe,  principally  in  Scotland,  the  country  of  his 
birth.  All  who  have  the  pleasure  of  knowing  him  will  cordially 
unite  with  us  in  wishing  that  the  voyage  may  be  attended  with  a 
large  measure  of  health  and  happiness.  As  an  active  manager  of 
the  St.  Andrew's  Society  Mr.  Wood  is  most  favorably  regarded  by  all 
the  members  of  that  association,  while  his  personal  character  greatly 
endears  him  to  his  brother  officers." 

Whereupon  I  wrote  the  following  sonnet  in  the  railway  car  from 
Hastings  to  New  York,  June  i,  1868  : 

"  And  so  he's  gone — our  ten  years'  guest — 

The  young  old  man,  our  friend  and  brother, 
Who  went  about  intending  good, 

Nor  ever  stopped  for  wind  or  weather  ; 
But  somehow  mostly  failed  to  bring 

His  purposes  and  acts  together. 
With  untold  gold  he  might  be  trusted, 

If  it  belonged  to  any  other  ; 
Yet  ne'er  his  own  accounts  adjusted, 

This  upright,  careless,  kindly  brother. 


366  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Well,  God  go  with  him  !     May  he  find 

In  health  his  sisters  o"er  the  water, 
And  not  forget  his  eldest  niece. 

But  see  her  husband,  son,  and  daughter." 

I  have  already  given  account  of  the  first  meeting  of  the  Board  of 
Public  Instruction,  but  the  twelve  members  of  that  board  were  also 
ex-officio  members  of  the  Board  of  Trustees  of  the  College  of  the 
City  of  New  York.  The  first  meeting  of  that  board  under  the  new 
rigime  took  place  Wednesday,  May  ^9.  [S69,  at  the  hall  of  the  Board 
of  Education.  On  motion  of  Trustee  Smyth,  Trustee  Gross  was 
appointed  chairman  pro  tern.  The  first  business  was  to  elect  a  per- 
manent chairman,  and  Richard  L.  Larremore  received  nine  votes, 
and  John  H.  Sherwood  one  vote.  Trustees  Wood  and  Bell  were 
appointed  a  committee  to  conduct  the  chairman-elect  to  the  chair. 

Then  William  Hitchman,  previously  Speaker  of  the  Assembly, 
was  elected  secretary  by  ten  votes.  Finally  the  executive  commit- 
tee was  appointed  by  the  chair,  and  consisted  of  Trustees  Gross, 
Sands,  Lewis,  Duryea,  Smyth,  Sherwood,  and  Brennan.  Although  the 
only  university-bred  man  in  the  board,  I  was  not  put  on  the  execu- 
tive committee,  because,  at  the  time,  I  was  opposed  to  "  the  higher 
education  system"  at  the  city's  expense. 

The  Board  of  Trustees  then  adjourned  and  did  not  meet  again 
until  June  15,  1869,  in  special  meeting,  the  object  being  to  consider 
a  proper  future  course  of  study  for  the  college,  and  in  order  that  the 
trustees  might  have  ample  time  to  consider  the  matter,  any  definite 
action  was  postponed  until  a  special  meeting,  called  for  the  first 
week  in  September,  met. 

The  next  meeting  was  a  stated  session  of  the  Board  of  Trustees 
held  on  June  21,  1869.  At  this  meeting,  on  motion  of  Trustee  Tim- 
othy Brennan,  General  Alexander  S.  Webb  was  elected  president  of 
the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York  by  the  following  vote  : 

Trustees  Larremore,  Brennan,  Lewis,  Wood,  Sands,  Gross, 
Smyth,  and  Bell — eight  in  all. 

The  board  then  adjourned. 

To  return  now  to  the  Board  of  Education.  I  appear  to  have 
begun  my  visitation  of  the  common  schools  by  visiting  with  Timothy 
Brennan  Grammar  Schools  23  and  24,  and  Primaries  8  and  2,  all  in 
the  Sixth  Ward,  on   May   13,  1869.     My  next  visit,  also  with  Tim- 


WORK   IN   THE   BOARD   OF   EDUCATION.  367 

othy  Brennan,  was  to  Grammar  School  29,  in  Greenwich  Street  near 
Rector,  in  First  Ward,  and  also  Primaries  15  and  38,  then  both  in 
First  Ward. 

On  May  21,  1869,  I  visited  for  the  first  time  Girls'  Grammar 
School  No.  47,  better  known  by  the  name  of  the  Twelfth  Street 
School,  then,  and  for  many  a  long  year  afterward,  the  best  girls* 
grammar  school  in  New  York,  first  under  Miss  Wadleigh  as  principal, 
and  then  under  Miss  Sarah  E.  Woodward,  who  subsequently  became 
Mrs.  Cowles. 

On  the  same  day.  May  21,  I  also  visited  the  best  boys'  grammar 
school  in  New  York,  No.  35,  in  West  Thirteenth  Street,  of  which 
Thomas  Hunter  was  principal.  Both  these  celebrated  schools  were 
in  the  Fifteenth  Ward.  On  this  day  Alfred  Pell,  my  brother-in-law, 
died  at  Pellwood,  near  West  Point. 

On  Tuesday,  May  25,  I  visited  Grammar  School  No.  35,  at  9  a.  m., 
and  spoke  before  James  W.  Girard. 

On  May  26,  at  the  suggestion  of  one  of  my  colleagues  in  the 
Board  of  Education,  Mr.  William  E.  Duryea,  I  called  on  Mr.  Thomas 
Hunter,  principal  of  Grammar  School  No.  35,  to  get  his  views  on  the 
system  of  marking.  Sitting  on  the  platform  with  him  was  J.  S.  Bab- 
cock,  who  was  principal  of  Grammar  School  No.  54,  and  who  was  also 
reader  to  the  Board  of  Education,  whose  duty  it  then  was,  at  each 
meeting  of  the  board,  to  read  aloud  the  minutes  of  the  previous 
meeting.  This  had  to  be  done  ore  rotundo,  but  he  did  it  so  quickly 
that  it  was  almost  impossible  to  follow,  or  take  in  the  minutes,  and 
among  the  first  things  that  I  tliought  of  Avas  to  abolish  the  reading 
and  have  the  minutes  of  every  meeting  printed  in  time  to  be  some 
days  in  the  hands  of  the  members  before  the  next  meeting.  This  was 
of  course  a  sensible  change,  but  not  profitable  to  my  friend  Babcock. 
I  find  that  the  plan  was  adopted  on  my  motion,  at  the  meeting  of 
October  6,  1869.  Probably  Mr.  Babcock  may  have  heard  of  the 
prospect  of  such  a  change,  and  that  I  was  at  the  bottom  of  it.  Any- 
how, both  he  and  Mr.  Hunter  gave  me  anything  but  a  cordial  recep- 
tion, and  I  felt  as  if  I  were  some  impudent  book  agent  who  was 
intruding  where  he  was  not  wanted,  instead  of  a  commissioner,  who 
was  simply  endeavoring  to  do  his  duty.  I  mention  this  curious  be- 
ginning of  my  acquaintance  with  these  two  gentlemen  which  ripened 
into  friendships  of  some  quarter  of  a  century.     I   have  given   my 


368  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF  WILLIAM   WOOD. 

surmise  as  to  Mr.  Babcock's  feelings.  Mr.  Hunter's,  I  found  out 
long  afterward,  was  caused  by  his  belief  that  I  was  opposed  to 
"  higher  education  "  at  public  expense,  which  I  certainly  was  at  that 
time. 

Up  to  the  vacation  of  1869,  which  in  those  days  began  the  Friday 
before  the  last  Friday  in  July,  I  was  constantly  visiting  schools  and 
going  through  every  department  and  every  class,  and  after  the  vaca- 
tion of  1869  I  resumed  this  work.  By  the  end  of  that  year  I  had 
visited  every  schoolhouse,  and  every  department,  and  every  class  in 
the  city  of  New  York.  The  city  was  then  bounded  by  the  Harlem 
River,  and  consisted  of  twenty-two  wards.  Each  ward  had  five 
school  trustees,  originally  elected  by  the  people,  then  nominated  by 
the  mayor,  and  finally,  and  as  at  present,  nominated  by  the  Board  of 
Education.  There  was  then,  as  there  is  now,  a  third  class  in  this 
educational  hierarchy  called  inspectors,  of  whom  there  were  three 
for  each  of  the  seven  districts.  I  have  always  looked  upon  the 
inspectors  as  a  body  of  very  little  use,  although  there  have  been 
remarkable  exceptions  to  this  rule,  as  James  W.  Girard,  Alexander 
McC.  Agnew,  and  of  the  existing  set,  Benjamin  Blumenlhal  and 
Dr.  G.  F.  Jackson.  Besides  visiting  the  schools  I  attended  their 
visitation  by  the  superintendents,  and  their  examinations,  and 
learned  to  know  eventually  the  methods  of  Kiddle,  Harrison,  etc. 


CHAPTER    XXVI. 

ORGANIZATION    OF    THE    GIRLS'    NORMAL    SCHOOL    AND    OF    THE 
DEPARTMENT     OF     DOCKS. 

At  the  time  the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York  was  established 
in  1849  3.  law  was  passed  authorizing  the  establishment  of  a  similar 
institution  for  girls,  but  nothing  really  effectual  was  done  until  the 
board  of  twelve  members,  taking  office  in  May,  1869,  came  into 
power.  The  previous  board,  which  went  out  of  power  at  that  time, 
had  appropriated  one  hundred  thousand  dollars  for  the  building  of  a 
daily  Normal  School  for  girls,  and  had  also  obtained  a  site  for  the 
same  on  West  Sixty-first  Street,  containing  about  six  city  lots.  The 
smallness  of  the  sum  appropriated,  and  the  smallness  of  the  site, 
showed  what  very  inadequate  ideas  that  board  had  of  the  necessities 
of  the  city.  In  point  of  fact,  the  site  in  Sixty-first  Street  was  never 
used,  as  far  as  I  recollect,  even  for  a  school  site,  and,  I  think,  was 
resold  by  the  city. 

On  November  17,  1869,  Commissioner  Isaac  Bell  offered  the  fol- 
lowing resolutions  : 

"  Resolved^  That  the  Committee  on  Normal,  Evening,  and  Colored 
Schools  recommend  the  establishment  of  a  daily  normal  school  for 
females." 

"  Resolved^  That  a  daily  normal  school  for  females  be,  and  the 
same  is  hereby  authorized  and  established,  under  the  immediate 
direction  and  government  of  the  Committee  on  Normal,  Evening, 
and  Colored  Schools. 

"  Resolved^  That  the  Committee  on  Normal,  Evening,  and  Colored 
Schools  be,  and  are  hereby  authorized  to  lease  the  third  floor  of  the 
premises  No.  691  Broad vvay  for  the  term  of  one  year  and  five  months, 
from  the  first  day  of  December  next,  at  the  annual  rent  of  five  thou- 
sand dollars,  with  the  option  of  a  further  rent  of  said  premises,  at 
the  expiration  of  said  term,  for  one  year  at  an  annual  rent  of  six 
thousand   dollars  ;  and  that  said  committee  are  hereby  authorized 

369 


370  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF     WILLIAM     WOOD. 

to  execute  the  lease  of  said   premises,  as   herein   specified,  with   the 
usual  covenants. 

"  Resolved,  That  the  Committee  on  Normal,  Evening,  and  Colored 
Schools  be,  and  they  are  hereby  authorized  to  prepare  and  suitably 
furnish  the  premises  No.  691  Broadway  for  the  use  of  said  daily 
normal  school. 

"  Resolved,  That  the  said  committee  be,  and  they  hereby  are, 
instructed  to  prepare  and  present  to  this  board,  at  the  next  regular 
meeting,  a  plan  for  the  organization  and  government  of  said  daily 
normal  school. 

"  Isaac  Bell, 
Wm.  E.  Duryea, 
Magnus  Gross, 
"Committee  on  Normal,  Evening,  and  Colored  Schools." 

This  is  the  first  mention  in  the  minutes  of  the  Board  of  Education 
of  this  daily  normal  school,  but  it  had  been  for  some  weeks  discussed 
in  committee,  and  Isaac  Bell  and  I  were  appointed  a  sub-committee 
to  find  suitable  premises  for  carrying  it  on.  We  looked  at  several 
places,  but  did  not  consider  them  suitable.  One  afternoon  he  and 
I  were  walking  up  Broadway  on  the  west  side,  and  when  we  came 
opposite  Fourth  Street,  I  said  :  "Why,  there  is  a  capital  new  build- 
ing, and  well  situated,  if  we  can  find  room  in  it.  Let's  go  and  look 
at  it."  We  did  so,  and  decided  to  hire  rooms  there,  if  we  could 
obtain  them  at  a  reasonable  price.  We  succeeded  in  doing  so,  as 
stated  in  the  above  resolution. 

Although  there  is  nothing  in  the  minutes  of  the  Board  of  Educa- 
tion prior  to  the  above  resolution,  yet  there  must  be  minutes  in  the 
committee  records  of  many  meetings,  for  it  was  prior  to  November 
17,  1869,  that  we  had  Messrs.  Hunter  and  David  B.  Scott  before  us, 
and  determined  to  elect  one  of  them  president  and  the  other  vice 
president  of  the  new  normal  or  high  school.  Mr.  Thomas  Hunter 
generously  offered  to  take  the  vice  presidency,  giving  Mr.  David  B. 
Scott  the  presidency  ;  but  David  B.  was  a  "canny  Scot,"  and  having 
already  the  principalship  of  Grammar  School  No.  40,  thought  that 
he  would  stick  by  that,  and  not  venture  upon  a  new  and  untried 
career.  So  Mr.  Hunter  was  elected  president,  although  he  was 
principal   of   Grammar   School   35,    which   stood   even   higher   than 


ORGANIZATION   OF   THE    GIRL'S   NORMAL    SCHOOL.        371 

Scott's  Grammar  School  No.  40.  Mr.  Hunter  looked  far  ahead,  and 
saw  the  absolute  necessity  of  providing  thoroughly  educated  female 
teachers  for  our  common  schools  ;  and  with  this  great  end  in  view, 
he  courageously  took  all  the  risks,  and  gave  up  his  splendid  gram- 
mar school.  He  foresaw,  too,  that,  above  and  beyond  providing 
competent  teachers  for  our  common  schools,  the  higher  education 
of  women  would  provide  educated  wives  and  mothers  for  the  future 
citizens  and  children  of  New  York.  Children  here — more,  perhaps, 
than  in  any  other  city  in  the  world — must  be  dependent  on  their 
mothers  for  their  up-bringing,  the  fathers  having  their  business  to 
attend  to  all  day,  and  mainly  at  the  opposite  end  of  the  island  from 
their  dwelling-places. 

When  David  B.  Scott  decided  not  to  be  either  president  (which 
Mr.  Hunter  most  generously  and  most  willingly  would  have  con- 
ceded to  him)  or  vice  president  of  the  new  institution,  we  had  to 
cast  about  for  another  vice  president,  and  Mr.  Arthur  H.  Dundon, 
the  teacher  of  a  school  in  Jersey  City,  who  also  taught  political 
economy  in  the  Evening  High  School  under  Mr.  Hunter,  and  had 
the  political  influence  of  Peter  B.  Sweeny  to  back  him,  was  selected 
to  be  vice  president.  I  knew  nothing  about  him,  excepting  that  he 
was  a  free  trader.  After  we  had  elected  the  president  and  vice 
president  of  the  new  institute  we  sent  them  out  to  visit  the  normal 
schools  at  Boston,  Salem,  Bridgewater,  Westfield,  Albany,  Oswego, 
Trenton,  Philadelphia,  and  Baltimore. 

On  November  15,  1869,  there  is  printed  in  the  minutes  of  the 
Board  of  Education  a  report  of  the  committee  on  by-laws  and 
organizing  the  new  Female  Normal  School,  which  occupies  from 
page  317  to  page  324,  consisting  of  20  sections,  and  is  signed  by 
Bernard  Smyth   and  \V.  E.  Duryea,  as  committee  on  by-laws,  etc. 

On  December  29,  1869,  Commissioner  Bell  presented  a  report 
from  the  Committee  on  Normal,  Evening,  and  Colored  Schools, 
appropriating  $5200  for  the  purpose  of  furnishing  the  Normal 
School.  This  is  the  last  allusion  to  the  Normal  School  for  Females 
in  1869. 

After  the  re-election  of  Richard  Larremore  as  president  of  the 
Board  of  Education  in  January,  1870,  he  appointed  the  standing 
committees,  and  in  addition  to  those  I  had  served  on  before  he 
appointed  me  a  member  of  the  committee  on  "  Normal,  Evening,  and 


372  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Colored  Schools."  This  brought  me  into  direct  touch  with  the 
Female  Normal  School.  The  members  of  this  committee  were  : 
Isaac  Bell,  William  E.  Duryea,  Magnus  Gross,  Bernard  Smyth, 
William  Wood. 

The  organizing  of  the  Normal  School  went  on  by  the  committee 
assisted  by  Mr.  Thomas  Hunter,  and  its  meetings  were  held  in  the 
trustees'  room  of  Female  Grammar  School  No.  47,  East  Twelfth 
Street,  that  being  better  adapted  for  the  purpose  than  any  room  in 
Mr.  Hunter's  own  school.  No.  35,  yet  conveniently  near  to  it 
for  him. 

The  first  meeting  of  the  Female  Normal  School  took  place  in 
the  rooms  leased  for  it  from  Henry  Mason,  Esq.,  Fourth  Street  and 
Broadway,  on  February  14  (of  all  days  in  the  year,  St.  Valentine's 
day),  1870.  No  notice  of  this  important  event  was  given  in  the 
minutes  of  the  Board  of  Education,  but  notices  must  have  been 
sent  out  in  some  way,  for  there  was  quite  a  large  assembly  of  nota- 
bles in  addition  to  President  Hunter  and  his  staff  of  professors  and 
tutors.  The  then  president  of  the  Board  of  Education,  R.  L. 
Larremore,  was  there  and  spoke,  and  I  shall  endeavor  to  get  the 
other  names  from  the  Visitors'  Book  up  at  the  Normal  College.* 

The  school  opened  with  an  attendance  of  three  hundred  pupils 
from  the  supplementary  classes  of  the  common  schools. f 

As  early  as  1870  the  German  citizens  began  to  show  their  belief 
in  themselves,  although  it  was  not  until  the  following  year  that  their 
victory  over  the  French  rendered  them  so  cock-a-hoop  as  to  make 
them  unbearable,  and  on  February  16,  1870,  the  trustees  of  the 
Seventh  Ward  presented  a  petition  to  the  Board  of  Education 
requesting  that  the  Celtic  language  might  be  taught  in  the  schools 
if  German  were  to  be,  and  the  German  element  had  even  then 
proposed  that  the  children  of  the  common  schools  should  Avear  a 
uniform.  In  reference  to  these  matters,  I  see  that  I  made  the  fol- 
lowing speech,  as  reported  in  one  of  the  daily  papers  : 

*This  I  have  done  to-day,  July  13,  1893.  The  signatures  of  those  present  in 
order  are  as  follows  :  Richard  L.  Larremore,  Isaac  Bell,  Bernard  Smyth,  William 
Wood,  William  E.  Duryea,  James  S.  Barron,  W.  W.  Adams,  James  Kelly, 
Andrew  Mills,  H.  Jameson,  Fred  Holster,  C.  S.  Ward. 

I  On  November  23,  1892,  I  was  up  at  the  Normal  College  and  opened  it  by 
reading  55th  Isaiah,  and  on  that  day  there  were  on  register  191 5  students  besides 
the  1200  on  register  in  Training  Department. 


THE   DEPARTMENT   OF   DOCKS.  373 

"I  sincerely  hope  that  the  letter  will  go  to  the  committee,  and 
receive  their  approval.  I  am  strongly  opposed  to  the  special  teach- 
ing of  German  in  the  common  schools,  for  I  don't  think  that  we 
come  here  to  make  foreign  citizens,  but  American.  But  I  can't  see, 
if  German  is  to  be  taught,  why  Irish  should  not  be  taught  as  well. 
I  fancy  that  the  Irish  are  still  in  a  majority  in  this  city,  and,  there- 
fore, it  would  not  be  unfair  if  they  were  to  ask  that  the  Irish  lan- 
guage be  taught,  as  well  as  the  German.  And  then,  if  we  are  to 
have  teachers  of  Irish,  we  shall  have  to  modify  our  music,  and 
instead  of  using  pianos  we  must  have  the  'Harp  that  once  through 
Tara's  halls  the  soul  of  music  shed.'  I  would  even  go  a  little 
further  and  suggest  that  in  those  schools  where  the  Scoto-American 
element  prevails  we  should  also  have  the  bagpipes.  Then  there  is 
another  thing  that  the  Germans  suggested.  One  of  their  petitions 
was  to  the  effect  that  a  uniform  should  be  adopted  for  our  common 
school  pupils.  If  that  should  ever  come  to  pass,  I  hope  that  the  garb 
of  old  Gaul  will  be  adopted,  for  it  will  give  excellent  ventilation  to 
our  boys'  limbs,  and  save  the  mother's  mending  the  seats  of  their 
breeches,  which  get  frequently  worn  out  nowadays.  But  if  the 
Irish  language  is  not  to  be  admitted,  then  I  think  that  a  very  good 
reason  why  German  should  be  abolished  as  a  part  of  the  common 
school  curriculum." 

It  was  sometime  during  the  existence  of  the  "  British  and 
American  Banking  Corporation,  Limited,"  probably  in  1864,  that 
John  Cross  and  I  were  walking  home  together  about  4.30  p.  M. 
We  had  crossed  from  Wall  Street  into  Pine  Street,  and  noticed  a 
crowd  in  a  room  used  as  a  temporary  Merchants'  Exchange, 
north  side  of  Pine  Street.  We  stopped  and  looked  in,  and  then 
entered,  and  found  Nathaniel  Sands  in  the  chair,  presiding  over 
a  meeting  held  for  the  purpose  of  getting  a  Dock  Department 
organized.  When  Sands  saw  me  he  called  me  to  the  platform, 
and  as  he  knew  that  I  had  lived  for  twelve  years  in  Liverpool, 
and  had  paid  considerable  attention  to  the  docks  there,  and  the 
administration  of  the  Dock  Department  of  that  city,  he  asked  me 
to  state  to  the  meeting  my  views  as  to  improving  the  dock  system 
of  New  York.  This  I  did,  and  found  myself  appointed  there  and 
then  a  member  of  a  committee  to  bring  about  legislation  in  favor 


374  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

of  creating  a  Dock  Department.  We  held  many  meetings,  and 
I  called,  I  think,  more  than  once  on  the  then  mayor  (Hoffman), 
but  he  did  not  take  any  effective  interest  in  the  matter.  When 
Oakey  Hall  became  mayor,  urged  by  the  continued  pressure  of 
the  Citizens'  Association  with  its  president,  Peter  Cooper,  and 
its  active  secretary,  Nathaniel  Sands,  actual  legislative  steps  were 
taken  to  create  a  Dock  Department.  As  soon  as  the  law  was  passed 
at  Albany  for  the  creation  of  a  Dock  Department  Mayor  Hall  pro- 
ceeded to  appoint  the  commissioners,  which  he  did  on  April  i6, 
1870,  along  with  the  various  other  commissioners  of  the  different 
departments  of  the  city  government.  The  Commissioners  of  Docks 
were  appointed  as  follows,  and  I  believe  in  the  following  order  : 
Wilson  G.  Hunt,  William  Wood,  John  T.  Agnew,  Hugh  Smith, 
Richard  M.  Henry. 

I  shall  only  quote  what  the  Herald  and  Evenmg  Post  said  of 
myself  on  April  11,  1870. 

The  Herald  says  :  "  William  Wood,  lately  of  the  firm  of  Den- 
nistoun  &  Wood,  has  large  business  experience,  is  conversant  with 
the  wants  of  the  city  in  the  way  of  dock  accommodations  and 
improvements,  is  a  well-known  business  man,  possesses  great 
capacity  for  the  understanding  and  transaction  of  public  affairs, 
and  peculiarly  fitted  for  the  discharge  of  the  important  trust  com- 
mitted to  him.  He  will  prove  a  most  desirable  acquisition  to  the 
board  of  which  he  is  to  form  a  member." 

The  Evetiing  Post  of  April  11,  1870,  says:  "In  the  Department 
of  Docks,  the  commissioners  (who  hold  office  for  five  years)  are  : 
Wilson  G.  Hunt,  a  well-known  merchant,  one  of  the  most  honora- 
ble and  public  spirited  citizens  of  New  York,  a  man  of  long  expe- 
rience in  municipal  affairs  ;  John  T.  Agnew,  a  man  of  like  charac- 
ter with  Mr.  Hunt  ;  William  Wood,  formerly  of  the  firm  of 
Dennistoun,  Wood  &  Co.,  an  enlightened  and  upright  citizen,  like 
Mr.  Hunt,  long  personally  interested  in  city  affairs,  and  now  a 
member  of  the  Board  of  Education  ;  Richard  M.  Henry,  Secretary 
of  the  Citizens'  Association,  and  Hugh  Smith,  Deputy  Chamberlain, 
and  a  friend  of  Peter  B.  Sweeny." 

So  the  first  Department  of  Docks  was  organized,  and  met,  until 
we  got  rooms  of  our  own,  in  the  rooms  of  the  City  Chamberlain, 
then  1  think  Peter  B.  Sweeny.     We   elected   John   T.  Agnew  presi- 


THE    DEPARTMENT    OF   DOCKS.  375 

dent  of  the  board.  Our  first  business  was  to  find  a  competent 
engineer,  and  we  all  agreed  to  ask  General  George  B.  McClellan  to 
act  as  such,  and  leave  his  then  engagement  with  the  Stevens  of 
Hoboken,  who  gave  him  twenty  thousand  dollars  per  annum  to  look 
after  a  large  steamer  wliich  they  had  built  for  war  purposes.  All 
the  dock  commissioners  went  over  to  Hoboken  to  see  General 
McClellan  and  to  invite  him  to  take  the  engineership  of  the  De- 
partment of  Docks,  we  agreeing  to  give  him  the  same  salary  as 
he  had  from  the  Stevenses — viz.,  twenty  thousand  dollars  per 
annum. 

After  getting  a  head  engineer  for  the  Dock  Department,  the  next 
thing  was  to  find  a  good  secretary.  For  this  office  a  Mr.  George  W. 
Blunt,  a  prominent  Republican,  was  a  candidate.  The  dock  com- 
missioners, being  all  Democrats,  did  not  wish  to  have  a  Republican 
secretary,  and  none  of  us,  as  far  as  I  know,  were  personally  ac- 
quainted with  Mr.  Blunt.  All  of  us  were  on  the  outlook  for  a  good 
secretary  ;  and  one  morning,  as  I  was  walking  downtown,  a  little 
north  of  Grace  Church,  I  saw  John  Grenville  Kane,  my  nephew  by 
marriage,  walking  before  me,  and  I  said  to  myself  :  "  Why,  there  is 
the  very  man  for  us,  if  he  will  take  the  place  ;  a  gentleman  by  birth 
and  education,  a  graduate  of  Columbia  College  and  of  the  Colum- 
bia College  Law  School."  So  I  walked  quickly  after  him,  and,  tap- 
ping him  on  the  shoulder,  explained  the  situation.  "  Now,"  said  I, 
"  if  you  would  like  the  place,  you  must  go  and  see  John  T.  Agnew, 
our  chairman,  and  Wilson  G.  Hunt.  I  cannot  propose  you,  as 
you  are  my  nephew,  and  it  would  savor  too  much  of  nepotism  for 
me  to  propose  you  ;  but  if  either  of  these  gentlemen  will  propose 
you,  I  shall  have  pleasure  in  voting  for  you."  He  was  proposed 
by  Mr.  Agnew  and  unanimously  elected  secretary. 


CHAPTER    XXVII. 

AN  UNFINISHED  CHAPTER,  TELLING  OF  WORK.  IN  THE  DEPART- 
MENT OF  DOCKS  AND  BOARD  OF  EDUCATION — THE  AUTOBIOG- 
RAPHY ENDING  ABRUPTLY  WITH  A  FEW  LINES  WRITTEN  MAY 
23,     1894. 

(March  15,  1894.  It  is  many  weeks  since  I  wrote  any  part  of 
this  autobiography,  having  had  many  worries  and  having  been  ill. 
Now  I  have  got  my  daughter  Harriet  to  act  as  my  secretary,  while  I 
intend  to  dictate  to  her.) 

My  connection  with  the  Dock  Department  lasted  from  1870  to  1873, 
and  I  was  very  much  interested  in  the  anticipated  development  of 
a  proper  dock  system  for  the  city  of  New  York.  Our  able  engineer, 
General  McClellan,  drew  up  excellent  plans  which,  after  due  con- 
sideration at  their  meetings  by  the  commissioners,  were  adopted, 
and  the  work  of  making  preliminary  surveys  was  pushed  forward 
with  assiduity.  But  I  will  not  attempt  to  go  into  details  because 
there  are  printed  reports  of  our  operations,  and  I  will  merely  men- 
tion a  few  circumstances  connected  with  the  working  of  the 
department. 

The  first  break  in  our  commission  was  the  resignation  of  Com- 
missioner Hugh  Smith,  who  was  succeeded  by  his  brother,  Henry 
Smith.  The  former  had  been  City  Treasurer,  and  his  brother  was 
elected  to  the  same  office.  After  some  months  Henry  Smith  also 
retired,  and  Mayor  Oakey  Hall  came  up  to  our  office  one  day  when 
I  was  alone  in  it,  and  asked  me  if  I  thought  our  secretary,  John 
Grenville  Kane,  would  make  a  good  commissioner  to  fill  the  vacancy 
caused  by  Henry  Smith's  resignation.  I  said  that  I  thought  he 
would  be  the  right  man  in  the  right  place,  but  that  as  he  was  my 
nephew  I  wished  he  would  take  the  opinions  of  the  other  com- 
missioners before  appointing  him.  He  said,  however,  that  he  had 
decided  to  make  the  appointment,  and  so  John  G.  Kane  became  a 
commissioner  with  a  salary  of  ten  thousand  dollars  a  year.  The 
commissioners  then   elected    me    treasurer,    but    as    such    it   would 

376 


AN    UNFINISHED    CHAFTKK.  377 

be  necessary  for  me  to  furnish  a  bond  for  thirty  thousand  dollars. 
This  I  declined  to  do,  stating  that  before  I  was  twenty  I  was 
a  partner  with  my  uncles,  Alexander  and  John  Dennistoun, 
and  dealing  with  sums  as  large  as  I  was  likely  to  have  to  deal 
with  as  treasurer  of  the  Department  of  Docks  ;  that  I  had  never 
been  asked  to  give  any  security,  and  never  would.  Upon  this 
they  unanimously  elected  me  acting  treasurer  where  no  security 
was  required.  I  repeatedly  pressed  my  resignation  of  tliis  office 
because  I  was  chairman  of  the  auditing  committee,  and  was  there- 
fore put  in  the  anomolous  position  of  auditing  my  own  accounts  ; 
but  I  could  never  get  the  board  to  accept  my  resignation,  and  so 
held  the  office  until  the  Republicans  turned  us  all  out  in  May,  1873. 

Dock  laborers  were  an  extremely  rough  set,  and  our  cashkeeper, 
William  Wallace  Burnham,  on  pay  days  always  sat  at  his  desk  inside 
a  railing,  with  banknotes  on  one  side  of  him  and  a  loaded  pistol  on 
the  other.  It  was  part  of  our  duty  to  clear  away  the  encumbrances 
on  and  alongside  the  bulkheads,  and  in  doing  so  we  sometimes  had 
to  employ  an  hundred  of  our  own  men  and  fifty  police. 

In  clearing  away  the  encumbrances  on  the  bulkheads  a  certain 
firm  sent  up  to  the  office  for  some  of  the  commissioners  to  come 
down  and  look  at  the  only  encumbrance  it  had,  which  was  a  small 
desk  under  a  shed,  for  a  clerk  to  take  note  of  goods  coming  out  or 
going  in  to  their  vessel.  Our  president,  John  T.  Agnew,  Wilson  G. 
Hunt,  John  G.  Kane,  and  myself  were  all  standing  about  sixty  feet 
from  the  bulkhead  when  the  clerk  came  from  his  desk,  and  asked 
Mr.  Wilson  G.  Hunt  to  step  to  his  desk,  because  he  v/anted  to  speak 
to  him.  In  a  few  moments  Mr.  Hunt  returned  to  us,  with  his  face 
almost  scarlet,  and  in  great  wrath  and  indignation,  and  said  :  "  Gen- 
tlemen, that  scoundrel  has  just  offered  me  twenty  dollars  to  allow 
him  to  let  his  encumbrance  remain  on  the  bulkhead,  and  I  insist 
upon  his  being  ordered  before  the  board  to  be  reprimanded." 
Which  he  was.  But  we  all  laughed  heartily  at  a  bribe  of  twenty 
dollars  being  offered  to  a  man  whose  fortune  was  estimated  at  six 
or  seven  million  dollars.  Mr.  Hunt  and  I,  while  commissioners  to- 
gether of  the  Dock  Department,  made  an  elaborate  calculation,  by 
which  we  proved  to  our  own  satisfaction  that  we  could  carry  out  the 
plans  regarding  the  building  of  docks  adopted  by  the  board,  pro- 
vided we  could  get  the  money  from  the  city  as  we  wanted  it,  and 


378  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

within  thirty  years  would  put  the  whole  system  of  docks  in  the  hands 
of  the  city,  with  the  whole  cost  recouped. 

I  am  happy  to  say  that  Mr.  Hunt,  whose  good  opinion  is  worth 
having,  said  lie  would  die  happy  if  he  saw  me  comptroller  of  this 
city  ;  but  he  never  had  the  chance.  One  of  the  commissioners  told 
me  that  the  people  of  West  Washington  Market  and  the  neighboring 
bulkhead  had  said  that  if  they  caught  me  down  there  they  would 
throw  me  into  the  North  River,  on  account  of  the  active  part  I  per- 
sonally took  in  removing  encumbrances  on  and  alongside  the  bulk- 
heads. 

One  day  Mr.  Hunt,  John  G.  Kane,  and  I  were  driving  along  the 
bulkhead  in  a  carriage  on  business,  and  I  said  to  Mr.  Hunt,  "  Let 
us  go  through  West  Washington  Market,"  and  he  said,  "  No,  I  won't 
go  ;  they  might  pelt  us  with  eggs."  But  John  Kane  volunteered  to 
accompany  me,  and  we  went  and  walked  up  and  down  various  alleys 
and  were  well  looked  at,  but  not  spoken  to.  Not  satisfied  with  this 
visitation  of  that  notorious  market,  I  determined  to  go  alone  the 
next  day,  and  walked  through  every  alleyway  of  the  market,  and 
was  not  thrown  into  the  North  River.  On  the  contrary,  the  same 
commissioner  who  had  informed  me  of  the  intention  of  the  market 
men  to  drown  me,  told  me  that  one  of  them  said  to  him  after  my 
visit  that  I  was  a  very  benevolent-looking  old  gentleman.  We  com- 
missioners gave  to  each  of  ourselves  and  to  General  McClellan  a 
gold  badge,  to  be  worn  on  the  chest,  which  we  might  show  if  neces- 
sary in  visiting  the  different  docks.  These  badges  were  of  gold, 
made  by  Tiffany  &  Co.,  with  the  following  inscription  on  one  side  : 
"  Commissioner  of  the  Department  of  Docks,  City  of  New  York,"  with 
the  arms  of  the  city  in  relief  ;  the  other  side,  the  name  of  the  com- 
missioner— on  mine,  "  William  Wood,"  and  on  General  McClellan's 
his  name,  which  we  commissioners  presented  to  him,  and  cost  us  each, 
if  I  recollect  rightly,  $120,  which  we  paid  out  of  our  own  pockets. 

We  commissioners  also  gave  many  treats  to  our  friends  in  the  way 
of  steaming  round  the  shores  of  the  island  in  one  of  our  dock  barges. 
These  treats  were  superintended  by  a  very  jolly  fellow.  Captain 
Johnston,  in  the  employment  of  the  Dock  Department,  who  had 
commanded  vessels  all  over  the  world.  We  gave  very  sumptuous 
champagne  lunches,  which  used  to  cost  each  of  us  commissioners 
not  less  than  fifty  dollars. 


AN    UNFINISHED    CHAPTER.  379 

I  look  back  upon  my  connection  with  the  Dock  Department, 
Commissioners  Agnew,  Hunt,  Hugh  Smith,  Richard  M.  Henry,  John 
G.  Kane,  Engineer  G.  McClellan,  with  great  pleasure.  They  are 
all  gone  except  John  T.  Agnew  and  myself  (March,  1894). 

In  ascertaining  proper  foundations  for  bulkheads  and  docks  on  the 
line  of  Pier  41,  North  River,  Engineer  McClellan's  men  struck  a 
copious  spring  of  fresh  water  eighty-two  feet  below  the  bottom  of  the 
North  River.  We  had  a  bottle  of  it  as  a  curiosity  in  the  rooms  of 
the  Dock  Department,  Broadway.  I  wanted  to  utilize  it  for  the 
steam  engines  of  our  two  dock  barges,  etc.,  but  found  to  my  sur- 
prise that  the  supply  of  fresh  water  was  monopolized  by  certain  par- 
ties who  got  the  water  from  the  Croton  Water  Commissioners. 

Our  legal  time  as  Commissioners  of  Docks  expired  sometime  in 
the  beginning  of  April,  1873,  but  we  were  asked  to  continue  in  ofifice 
until  our  successors  were  appointed,  which  was  about  a  month  after- 
ward. The  night  before  our  successors  were  to  take  charge,  we  had 
the  bookkeeper  and  clerks,  etc.,  assembled  in  the  dock  ofifice,  for 
the  commissioners  to  bid  them  farewell,  and  William  Wallace  Burn- 
ham,  the  bookkeeper,  who  didn't  originally  like  me,  for  my  practice 
as  auditor  of  looking  particularly  into  every  item,  when  I  left  the 
ofifice  finally,  actually  lifted  up  his  voice  and  wept. 

When  the  new  commissioners  came  in,  everything  began  to  go  to 
the  dogs,  General  McClellan  having  also  resigned,  and  for  years 
the  Dock  Department  was  simply  a  refuge  for  impecunious  politicians 
of  both  parties. 

In  1881  Mayor  Grace  wished  to  nominate  me  as  Commissioner  of 
Docks,  but  by  the  then  law  I  could  not  hold  that  office  along  with 
that  of  Commissioner  of  Common  Schools,  and  so  declined  it,  but  I 
advised  him  to  nominate  General  McClellan  as  commissioner.  He 
thereupon  asked  me  to  go  and  see  General  McClellan,  and  ask  him 
if  he  would  accept  the  position  if  nominated.  The  general  replied 
that  he  would  like  a  night  to  consider,  and  he  would  give  me  his 
decision  next  morning.  During  the  evening  he  went  and  consulted 
John  T.  Agnew  and  Wilson  T.  Hunt,  and  they  both  advised  him  to 
decline  the  nomination  as  he  was  not  acquainted  with  the  then  exist- 
ing commissioners.  I  do  not  recollect  whom  Mayor  Grace  nomi- 
nated in  place  of  myself  or  General  McClellan. 

The  first  and  last  time  I  was   in  the  ofifice   of  the  Department  of 


380  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Docks,  after  going  out  in  1873,  was  in  the  summer  of  1888.  I  went 
there  to  inspect  the  dock  map  of  the  lower  part  of  the  island,  notably 
of  the  first  ward,  to  find  a  site  for  a  new  school  of  that  ward  which 
should  not  be  on  made  land.  I  did  not  succeed  in  doing  this,  and 
advised  the  purchase  of  the  lot  with  lights  on  three  sides  on  Albany, 
etc.,  streets,  the  school  building  on  which  is  now,  I  believe,  being 
built.  The  map  which  I  wished  to  consult  was  made  by  o^ir  com- 
mission, but  the  credit  of  making  it  was  assumed  without  any  warrant 
in  fact  by  our  successors. 

I  have  now  finished  all  tliat  I  shall  say  about  my  connection  with 
the  Department  of  Docks,  and  return  to  my  work  in  the  Depart- 
ment of  Education,  in  that  part  of  it  connected  with  the  College  of 
the  City  of  New  York. 

At  the  first  meeting  of  the  trustees  of  the  college,  after  the  vaca- 
tion of  1869,  Mr.  Sands  proposed  that  the  teaching  of  Latin  and 
Greek  should  be  done  away  with,  and  the  college  reduced  to  a  mere 
technological  institute.  Chairman  Larremore  and  I  were  opposed 
to  any  such  proceeding,  and  both  spoke  against  it.  My  speech  was 
as  follows  : 

"  I  do  hope  that  this  question  of  filling  up  the  chair  of  Latin  and 
Greek  will  be  settled  to-night,  especially  if  we  intend  to  continue  the 
Latin  and  Greek  studies  ;  if  we  do  not  intend,  why,  then  I  would 
rather  have  the  whole  question  indefinitely  postponed  [Laughter]. 
However,  I  wish  to  say  a  few  words  in  regard  to  the  subject  which 
I  consider  of  very  great  importance  ;  and  there  is  one  passage  in 
the  communication  of  the  gentleman  who  has  just  spoken  to  which 
I  would  like  to  refer.  He  says  in  his  letter  to  the  chairman  of  the 
Executive  Committee  :  '  I  pass  over  the  question  (on  which  consid- 
erable difference  of  opinion  exists)  as  to  the  propriety  of  sustaining 
at  all,  at  the  enforced  expense  of  the  public,  an  educational  institu- 
tion, to  supply  the  needs  which  the  College  of  the  City  of  New 
York  is  intended  to  meet.  The  college  exists  by  law ;  we  are 
guardians,  and  the  only  question  we  have  to  consider  is  how  most 
efficiently  and  most  economically  to  secure  the  attainment  of  the 
ends  desired  by  the  legislature.'  Now,  ray  position  in  regard  to  that 
point  is  just  this  :  I  am  accessory  after  the  fact.  I  understand  our 
duty  is  now  to  carry  on  the  college  in  the  way  most  beneficial  to  the 


AN    UNFINISHED    CHAPTER.  381 

Students  who  will  go  through  the  course.  There  can  be  but  little 
doubt  that,  until  within  the  last  twelve  years  or  so,  the  time  of 
students  in  the  English  universities  was  very  much  wasted  in  an 
almost  exclusive  application  to  classical  studies.  There  was  little 
attention  paid  to  mathematics  or  science.  But  it  was  not  so  in  my  own 
native  country.  In  Scotland  the  study  of  the  mathematics  and  t'ne 
sciences  was  attended  to  in  a  much  more  common-sense  manner. 
Therefore  I  may  say  that  I  am  quite  at  home  with  regard  to  these 
arguments.  And,  further,  having  had  a  scientific,  classical,  and 
physiological  training  in  two  Scottish  colleges,  and,  moreover,  having 
had  long  experience  as  a  merchant  and  banker  in  this  city,  I  presume 
I  can  give  a  faithful  opinion  upon  the  relative  advantages  of  classi- 
cal, as  opposed  to  mathematical  or  scientific,  studies.  And  my 
opinion  is  this  :  that  I  would,  upon  the  whole,  when  a  young  man 
has  to  choose  a  practical  profession,  and  make  his  way  in  the  world 
as  a  banker  or  merchant, — I  would  rather  he  should  have  a  classical, 
than  a  mathematical  or  scientific,  education.  And  for  this  reason  : 
A  man  who  has  been  educated  in  scientific  principles  looks  away  to 
certainties,  and  is  entirely  unfit  to  deal  with  probabilities.  Now,  we 
know  that  the  great  exercise  of  the  merchant  and  the  banker  is  to 
deal  with  probabilities  and  not  with  certainties,  and  consequently 
you  will  find  that,  when  persons  who  have  had  an  exclusively  scien- 
tific or  mathematical  training  come  to  deal  with  probabilities  they  act 
as  if  they  were  children.  They  assume  certain  things  which  they  think 
will  lead  to  given  conclusions  ;  they  trust  to  their  mathematical  demon- 
strations, and  in  the  end  they  get  into  a  frightful  muddle.  But  the 
fortunate  position  in  which  we  find  ourselves  placed  is  that,  in  our  col- 
lege, we  are  not  bound  to  choose  one  or  the  other.  We  are  not  on 
either  horn  of  the  dilemma.  You  can  have  the  mathematical  and  the 
scientific,  or  you  can  have  the  classical  and  the  scientific,  just  as  you 
please.  In  looking  over  the  different  lessons  of  the  whole  course  there 
of  five  years,  but  one-sixth  of  the  time  is  devoted  to  classical  studies. 
Milton,  in  his  'Tractate  on  Education,'  deprecates  too  much  time 
being  devoted  to  classical  studies,  but  he  does  not  propose  to  dis- 
pense with  them  altogether,  and,  indeed,  he  praises  them  highly,  and 
was  himself  the  greatest  classical  scholar  of  his  day.  But  the  dispo- 
sition now  is  to  swing  away  too  far  ;  the  swing  of  the  pendulum  is 
away  from  classical  studies  altogether.     We  want  to  have  facts — 


382  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

facts — nothing  but  facts.  The  Mr.  Gradgrinds  of  the  day  recognize 
nothing  better  to  be  put  into  the  hands  of  children  than  hard  facts. 
Now,  even  in  the  days  of  Milton,  there  was  a  tendency  toward  this 
sort  of  kwonledge.  The  tendency  of  the  Puritans  was  to  go 
in  for  knowledge  of  facts  ;  and  Butler  says  his  education  had 
been  wholly  of  a  scientific  cast,  and  the  result  of  it  he  gives  in 
'  Hudibras  '  : 

"  '  For  he,  by  geometric  scale. 

Could  take  the  size  of  pots  of  ale, 
Resolve  by  sines  and  tange'its  straight 
If  bread  or  butter  wanted  weight. 
And  wisely  tell  what  hour  o'  the  day 
The  clock  will  strike  by  algebra.' 


"  I  am  of  opinion  that  it  would  be  wise  to  retain  the  professorship  of 
Latin  and  Greek  ;  a  proper  combination  of  classical  and  mathemat- 
ical studies  is  the  sort  of  education  our  young  men  require,  and  with 
one  chair  for  the  two  languages  we  can  give  them  all  the  classical 
knowledge  they  require.  1  hold  that  every  boy  in  our  public 
schools — and  I  wish  I  could  say  every  girl,  too — has  a  sort  of  vested 
interest  in  this  College  of  the  City  of  New  York.  His  parents  know 
that  if  he  gets  on  with  his  studies  properly  in  the  schools,  and  his  life 
is  spared,  he  will  ultimately  be  able  to  claim  a  classical  and  scientific 
education.  The  parents  would  think  their  boy  unjustly  dealt 
with,  if  we  were  to  deprive  him  of  that  vested  interest.  When 
a  boy  is  taken  into  our  schools,  by  implication  we  promise  him  a 
collegiate  education.  There  is  another  point  which  is  made  in  this 
communication.  The  writer  says,  *  I  now  come  to  the  last  and  most 
serious  aspect,  that  classical  studies  have  a  most  pernicious  effect 
upon  the  morals  and  character  of  their  votaries.  It  should  not  be 
forgotten  that  Greeks  and  Romans  alike  lived  by  slavery  (which  is 
robbery),  by  rapine,  and  by  plunder.  Yet  we,  born  into  a  Christian 
community  which  lives  by  honest  labor,  propose  to  impregnate  the 
impressionable  minds  of  youth  with  the  morals  and  literature 
of  nations  of  robbers  !  '  We  must  not  forget  that  the  Egyp- 
tians and  Hindoos  were  a  highly  mathematical  people  ;  but  their 
morals  were  greatly  inferior  to  the  morals  of  the  Greeks  and 
Romans." 


AN    UNFINISHED    CHAPTER.  383 

I  concluded  by  quoting  the  following  lines  from  Montgomery  : 

"  '  To  plow  the  classic  soil, 

Intent  to  find  the  hidden  spoil 

Its  wealthy  furrows  yield, 

Till  all  is  thine  that  sages  taught, 

That  poets  sang  and  heroes  wrought.  '  " 

The  opinions  expressed  by  Chairman  Larremore  and  myself  not 
only  preserved  the  cultivation  of  the  two  classical  languages,  but 
obtained  a  professor  for  each  of  them  instead  of  having  only  one  for 
both.  The  Rev.  Dr.  Spencer  was  appointed  professor  of  Greek  and 
Dr.  Charles  G.  Herberman  professor  of  Latin.  The  former  was  a 
very  poor  appointment,  for  although  Dr.  Spencer  was  a  good  Greek 
scholar,  he  had  not  the  faculty  of  maintaining  order,  without  which 
scholarship  is  of  very  little  avail,  I  protested  against  his  appoint- 
ment from  the  very  beginning,  because  I  knew  he  had  not  been  able 
to  maintain  order  in  John  MacMullin's  school,  where  two  of  my  sons 
were  pupils,  and  in  which,  being  a  select  school,  order  was  more  easily 
maintainable  than  in  the  promiscuous  gathering  in  the  Greek  class  of 
the  City  College.  My  foresight  was  amply  confirmed  by  the  result, 
but  it  took  me  eleven  years  to  get  rid  of  him  and  to  get  the  Greek 
class  of  the  college  properly  taught.  After  having  been  relieved 
of  his  duties  at  the  college  he  went  for  change  of  air  to  North 
Pennsylvania,  where  he  met  with  General  T.  L.  Kane.  One 
day  he  was  left  alone  with  my  daughter,  Mrs.  Kane,  and  began 
to  give  her  a  sketch  of  his  life.  He  said  :  "  I  was  for  eleven 
years  professor  of  Greek  in  the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York, 
and  might  have  been  there  till  this  day,  but  one  of  the  trus- 
tees, an  obstinate  old  Scotsman  of  the  name  of  Wood,  had  a  preju- 
dice against  me,  and  never  rested  until  he  got  me  dismissed."  My 
daughter  heard  all  this,  but  never  let  him  know  that  "  the  obstinate 
old  Scotsman  "  was  her  father!  The  other  appointment,  Professor 
Herberman  to  the  chair  of  Latin,  was  a  most  satisfactory  and  an 
excellent  one. 

In  after  years  I  got  Principal  David  B.  Scott  appointed  professor 
of  pedagogy  and  principal  of  the  introductory  department  of  the 
college,  but  subsequently  it  was  found  out  by  my  friend  Stephen  A. 
Walker  that  there  was  no  law  authorizing  the  creation  of  an  intro- 
ductory department  in  the  college,  and  its  name  was  changed  to  the 


384  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

sub-freshman  class.  Subsequently,  on  the  death  of  Professor 
Barton,  David  B.  Scott  succeeded  to  the  professorship  of  English 
literature. 

(He  has  never  called  on  me  since  I  resigned  from  the  trusteeship 
of  the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York,  November  i,  1888,  and,  I 
hear,  is  now  [May  23,  1894]  very  ill,  and  supposed  to  be  dying. 
My  own  time  cannot  be  very  long,  and  if  I  ever  finish  this  long 
autobiography  it  can  only  be  by  curtailing  the  report  of  the  rest  of 
my  life  in  some  way.  And  yet  what  remains  is  more  interesting,  to 
myself  at  least,  than  what  has  gone  before,  containing,  as  it  does, 
the  building  and  opening  of  the  Normal  College  for  the  higher  edu- 
cation of  women,  but  more  especially  for  the  training  of  teachers 
for  our  common  schools.) 


The  remainder  of  this  volume  has  been  prepared  by  Mrs.  Elizabeth  D. 
Katie,  daughter  of  William  Wood,  Esq.,  and  wife  of  General  Thomas 
L.  Katie,  as  a  loving  tribute  to  the  blessed  tnemory  of  her  father. — 
H.  M.  W. 

Forty  years  ago  my  husband,  Thomas  L.  Kane,  who  deeply  loved 
and  honored  my  father,  urged  him  to  write  his  autobiography.  He 
began  doing  so  in  a  series  of  letters  to  me,  but  abandoned  the  work 
after  he  had  written  over  two  hundred  foolscap  pages.  When  he 
resumed  it  long  afterward,  as  the  amusement  of  his  old  age,  it  be- 
came my  privilege  during  my  annual  visits  to  him  to  read  and  criti- 
cise what  he  had  written,  and  to  divide  it  into  chapters.  I  promised 
that  I  would  edit  his  work  if  he  lived  to  finish  it,  or  complete  it 
after  his  death.  I  never  could  persuade  him  to  rewrite  a  paragraph 
or  alter  a  sentence.  All  that  he  left  to  me,  he  said.  As  for  him,  if 
he  wrote  at  all,  he  must  write  currente  calamo.  We  have  his  work, 
therefore,  written  in  a  fresh  and  easy  style,  wonderfully  vivacious 
when  one  remembers  that  the  writer  was  over  eighty  years  old  when 
he  commenced  the  autobiography  ;  but  as  he  never  paused  to  read 
over  what  he  had  written,  the  interest  he  had  in  following  one  part 
of  his  subject  to  its  close  led  him  sometimes  to  omit  the  mention  of 
important  events  in  the  history  of  his  life.  These  I  shall  briefly 
mention. 

The  last  paragraph  that  he  wrote  shows  me  how  ill-fitted  I  am  to 
complete  his  work.  Of  those  years  spent  in  the  Board  of  Educa- 
tion, of  which  he  says  that  he  thinks  them  the  most  interesting  in 
the  whole  of  his  life,  I  know  hardly  anything.  But  I  do  know  very 
well  that  his  labors  in  the  Board  of  Education  were  rewarded  in 
full  measure  by  the  occupation  of  his  time  and  thoughts  in  a  way 
that  enabled  him  to  serve  God  and  man,  and  to  divert  his  mind  from 
dwelling  on  the  sorrows  of  his  later  life. 

The  great  sorrow  of  his  life,  my  mother's  death,  worked  a  marked 
change  in  his  character.  From  being  the  person  most  tenderly 
considered  in  the  family,  every  anxiety  softened  by  sympathy,  every 
want  and  wish   that  love  could   foresee  and   gratify  anticipated,  he 

38s 


386  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF     WILLIAM     WOOD. 

became  the  solitary  head  of  the  family.  Thenceforward  he  minis- 
tered to  his  children's  needs  and  sought  to  sympathize  with  their 
feelings  and  to  forget  himself  in  them  and  in  his  business.  He  lived 
a  life  that  iniglit  be  called  external  to  his  own  individuality,  except 
in  so  far  as  he  dwelt  in  the  memory  of  the  past.  He  tested  our  actions 
and  his  own  by  the  scale  of  my  mother's  remembered  counsel,  and 
for  her  sake  controlled  his  naturally  quick  temper  and  became  gen- 
tle and  patient  with  us.  Up  to  the  time  of  her  death  he  had  been 
surrounded  by  an  atmosphere  of  loving  care  that  kept  from  him  all 
the  minor  annoyances  of  family  life,  or  let  the  knowledge  of  them 
serve  as  the  basis  of  an  amusing  story  when  he  came  home  to  his 
fireside  at  evening.  We  children  were  not  suffered  to  annoy  him, 
for  he  was  not  naturally  fond  of  children's  society.  We  made  our 
appearance  at  dessert,  nicely  dressed  and  on  our  best  behavior, 
and  were  gratified  to  eat  a  tiny  piece  of  a  fig  or  a  morsel  of  orange 
from  the  tip  of  our  father's  fork.  Then  we  retreated  to  our  chairs 
at  the  end  of  the  room,  and  did  not  speak  unless  spoken  to.  We 
held  our  father  in  the  greatest  awe,  and  while  our  mother  always 
believed  that  we  loved  iiim  as  we  loved  her,  I  think  that  in  those 
early  days  we  really  only  feared  him.  Our  parents  had  been 
brought  up  by  theirs  on  the  old  system  of  ivhipping  for  the  least 
offense,  and  as  they  sincerely  believed  in  its  efficacy,  we  looked  upon 
our  father  as  a  being  between  a  god  and  a  chief  executioner.  We 
seldom  saw  him  in  the  daytime,  as  we  had  our  meals  in  a  small 
breakfast  parlor,  while  our  father's  were  served  in  the  large  dining 
room  at  a  different  hour.  I  am  speaking  of  our  Everton  house,  the 
only  English  home  that  1  remember.  My  mother  lunched  with  us 
at  our  dinner  time,  and  chatted  over  all  our  childish  affairs.  But 
for  us  our  sweet,  merry  mother  would  have  been  very  lonely  during 
the  long  hours  of  ray  father's  daily  absence  at  his  office. 

With  my  mother's  death  our  happy  childhood  ended.  My  father, 
fortunately  for  his  mental  and  bodily  health,  was  obliged  to  take 
that  voyage  to  England  which  had  been  so  often  discussed  in  my 
parents'  letters.  Charlotte  was  only  fourteen,  but  she  courageously 
undertook  the  charge  of  her  young  brothers  and  sisters  in  his  ab- 
sence. My  aunt,  Mrs.  De  Peyster,  often  came  to  see  us  in  the 
boarding-house,  where  we  were  placed  for  the  summer,  and  my 
father  had  provided  an  experienced  nurse  for  the  little  baby,  as  well 


CONTINUATION    HV    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  387 

as  leaving  our  good  Powell  as  our  nursery  maid.  Material  wants  were 
thus  supplied,  but  Charlotte  had  the  responsibility  of  supervising 
our  summer  studies  and  trying  to  manage  us.  She  was  painfully 
anxious  to  carry  out  our  father's  instructions  to  the  letter,  poor 
young  sister,  and  how  we  all  suffered  in  the  hot  summer  days,  when 
she  exacted  from  us  and  from  herself  the  full  number  of  hours  of 
study  that  had  been  prescribed  ! 

We  were  used  to  the  cool  atmosphere  of  England  and  to  our 
large,  roomy  English  home.  Now  we  were  quartered  in  the  front 
rooms  of  a  Staten  Island  boarding-house,  heated  like  a  furnace  by 
the  reflection  from  the  waters  of  the  Kill  Von  Kull,  blazing  in  the 
morning  sunshine.  Lessons  over,  we  were  to  sew,  and  might  read 
aloud  the  "  wholesome  "  books  my  father  had  provided.  I  have  no 
doubt  that  they  were  excellent — for  grown-up  readers — but  for  a 
boy  of  fifteen  and  two  girls  of  fourteen  and  ten,  with  a  merry  little 
occasional  listener  in  my  seven-year-old  sister  Harriet,  they  were 
excessively  uninteresting.  We  plodded  through  them  for  two  hours 
a  day,  reading  aloud  alternately.  Their  contents  have  long  since 
faded  from  ray  memory,  but  I  remember  the  titles  of  two  or  three: 
"Life  of  Lorenzo  de  Medicis,"  "Life  of  Leo  the  Tenth,"  Hazlitt's 
"  Essays,"  and  there  was  a  very  long  work,  a  "  History  of  Literature 
in  Europe,"  out  of  which  we  picked  some  interesting  extracts.  We 
lightened  the  tedium  of  the  hour  by  refreshing  ourselves  with  lemon 
crackers  and  teasing  poor,  dear  Charlotte. 

All  through  that  long,  hot  summer,  Walter  and  Charlotte  headed 
our  little  flock  every  Sunday  to  a  church  at  Port  Richmond.  Part 
of  the  way  we  went  by  steamboat,  but  part  of  the  way  we  had  to 
walk  in  the  intense  glare  of  noonday,  panting  in  our  black  dresses. 
Some  kind  soul  among  the  boarders  lent  us  for  Sunday  afternoon 
reading  several  volumes  of  "  The  Lady  of  the  Manor."  My  later 
knowledge  leads  me  to  think  that  the  tales  related  by  the  Lady  of 
the  Manor,  in  illustration  of  the  troubles  consequent  upon  violations 
of  the  Ten  Commandments,  however  well  intended,  were  quite  unfit 
for  our  perusal.  But  we  innocently  and  eagerly  devoured  them,  and 
skipped  the  moral  teaching  sought  to  be  inculcated  at  the  end  of 
each. 

Baby  Alick  sickened  three  days  after  our  father  left  us,  and  after 
ten  days  of  suffering  died,  lying  on  Charlotte's  lap.     We  had   never 


388  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

watched  by  a  sick  bed  before,  and  there  were  kindly  women  in  the 
house  who  sought  to  help  us  in  our  trouble.  But  I  think  that  Char- 
lotte felt  as  if  she  would  be  somehow  to  blame  if  she  relinquished 
the  little  fellow  to  anyone. 

Another  calamity  distressed  us  all.  One  of  our  fellow-boarders, 
on  reaching  his  office  in  the  city,  received  a  letter  announcing  that 
his  nephew  and  adopted  son  had  embezzled  property  and  was  a 
fugitive  from  justice.  The  shock  killed  him  :  he  was  found  sitting 
in  his  chair,  dead,  with  the  open  letter  before  him.  Someone 
hastened  to  New  Brighton  and  blurted  out  the  story  to  the  poor 
wife.  At  the  moment  our  little  Helen  was  on  her  knee,  and  we 
were  near  her.  The  new-made  widow  gave  utterance  to  a  fearful 
scream,  and  went  out  of  her  mind.  She  was  soon  taken  away  to  an 
asylum,  but  the  shock  of  seeing  and  hearing  her  distress  had  a  bad 
effect  upon  us — nervous  little  things  as  we  were. 

My  father  returned  to  us  in  the  end  of  October,  bringing  with 
him  his  sweet  sister  Eliza,  and  happy  home  life  began  again. 

I  do  not  think  we  ever  enjoyed  evenings  so  much  as  those  when 
we  gathered  round  the  fire  in  the  autumn,  and  she  read  to  us  in  her 
fresh  voice  with  its  lovely  accent,  English  just  tinged  with  Scottish, 
the  "  Essays  of  Elia,"  which  my  father  had  brought  me  from  Eng- 
land. She  was  too  charming  a  woman  to  bless  us  long,  and  I  sup- 
pose that,  like  most  fond  wives,  she  did  not  fully  appreciate  my 
father's  insistence,  as  her  trustee,  in  securing  her  property  from  any 
claims  of  her  husband's  creditors.  She  was  always  loving  and  good 
to  us,  but  we  saw  less  of  her  after  her  marriage  than  our  affection 
demanded.  Charlotte  was  too  young  to  manage  our  father's  house- 
hold, and  in  his  second  wife  he  found  not  only  a  very  beautiful 
woman,  but  a  most  admirable  and  careful  housekeeper.  My  sister* 
continued  to  supervise  us  to  some  extent,  as  long  as  she  remained  in 
America,  but  she  had  never  liked   New  York,  the   climate   and   the 

*  Charlotte  returned  to  England,  first  on  visits  to  her  aunts,  and  then  took  up  her 
abode  there  permanently,  becoming  the  wife  of  a  clergyman.  She  led  a  life  of 
intense  activity  in  parish-work,  fulfilling  also  all  the  duties  of  wife,  mother,  and 
sick-nurse  when  her  husband's  health  gave  way.  She  published  two  books  for 
children,  "  Effie's  Year"  and  "  The  Cruise  of  Ulysses,"  which  were  reprinted  in 
America.  I  think  they  ran  through  two  editions.  Then  my  mother's  foresight  was 
painfully  proven,  by  a  complete  break-down  in  Charlotte's  health,  and  she  became 
a  chronic  invalid. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  389 

people  did  not  suit  her,  and  her  early  responsibilities  and  intense 
sympathy  for  my  father  told  upon  her  health  and  spirits. 

My  father,  from  the  time  of  his  return  to  America  in  1846,  took 
up  the  duty  of  training  our  hearts  and  minds  in  the  manner  pointed 
out  in  our  mother's  will.  His  naturally  quick  and  impatient  disposi- 
tion, and  absence  of  instinctive  liking  for  young  children,  made  the 
task  a  hard  one.  His  business  absorbed  his  time,  too,  to  a  great 
extent.  But  in  the  next  few  years,  as  we  grew  to  know  him,  our 
childish  awe  developed,  first  into  unquestioning  trust,  and  finally 
into  the  mixture  of  intense  affection,  loyal  friendship,  and  reverent 
sympathy  which  bound  us  to  him  for  half  a  century. 

It  seems  as  if  I  could  fix  the  time  when  he  won  my  heart  by  a 
frank  apology  for  an  undeserved  punishment.  The  punishment  was 
a  trifling  one,  but  he  was  sensible  that  he  would  not  have  inflicted 
it  if  he  had  not  been  worried  and  fretted  beyond  measure.  I  knew 
it,  too,  and  therefore  would  not  have  minded  the  punishment,  but 
the  generous  expression  of  his  regret  made  a  deep  impression  on  me. 

It  was  characteristic  of  him  to  be  entirely  honest  and  unaffected, 
no  consideration  of  superiority  of  age  or  position  ever  interfering 
with  his  treatment  of  other  persons. 

He  speaks  in  his  Life  about  this  time  as  "  a  sort  of  prosperous 
jog-trot."  It  was  rather  uneventful,  as  for  some  years  he  did  not 
enter  on  the  active  duties  of  an  American  citizen.  His  elder  chil- 
dren were  at  school,  and  I  do  not  remember  his  wife  going  much 
into  society. 

Our  cousin  and   stepmother,  Margaret  Lawrence,*   as  I    recollect 

*  Margaret  Lawrence  Wood  was  descended  on  the  paternal  side  from  Thomas 
Lawrence,  one  of  three  brothers,  who  emigrated  from  Great  St.  Albans,  Hertford- 
shire, England,  and  obtained  a  patent  for  a  tract  of  land  in  Newtown,  L.  I.,  in 
1655.  Thomas  Lawrence  subsequently  owned  all  of  Hell  Gate  Neck.  He  died 
at  Newtown  in  1703.  His  son  John,  who  was  a  cornet  of  dragoons,  and  subse- 
quently High  Sheriff  of  Queen's  County,  married  Deborah  Woodhull,  and  died  in 
1729.  Their  son  John  married  Patience  Sackett  and  died  1765.  Their  son  William 
married  Anna  Brinckerhoff  and  died  1 794.  Their  son  William  married  Margaret  Van 
Home,  and  their  son  James  Van  Home  Lawrence  married  Emily  Augusta  Kane  by 
whom  he  had  one  daughter,  Margaret.  Mr.  Lawrence  afterward  married  a  Miss 
Smith, by  whom  he  had  two  sons  and  a  daughter.  I  think  that  Margaret,  after  her 
mother's  early  death,  was  chiefly  brought  up  by  her  grandmother,  Mrs.  Wm.  Law- 
rence. J.  V.  H.  Lawrence  died  after  his  daughter  married  William  Wood.  She 
derived  much  of  her  beauty  from  him. 


390  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

her  before  her  marriage,  was  slender  and  very  graceful.  Her  face 
was  oval,  her  complexion  of  a  clear  paleness,  rather  dark  than  fair, 
with  beautifully  fine  and  glossy  raven-black  hair,  and  violet-blue  eyes. 
She  was  exquisitely  neat  in  her  dress  and  person,  refined  in 
speech,  and  pure-minded,  always  discountenancing  the  witty  double- 
entendres  in  which  some  of  her  matron  relatives  delighted.  In  time 
she  gained  flesh  and  color,  but  the  portrait  painted  of  her  by 
Fagnani  does  not  do  her  justice. 

She  was  naturally  of  a  quiet  disposition,  and  I  think  the  loss  of  her 
first  two  children  intensified  her  anxious  devotion  to  the  others,  and 
it  seems  to  me  as  if  her  nursery  and  home  duties  had  filled  her  life. 
I  believed  that  her  health  was  much  less  robust  than  it  appeared  to 
be,  and  that  some  affection  of  the  heart  aided  to  give  the  rosy 
color  to  her  formerly  pale  cheek.  She  was  ill  for  months  before 
her  death,  wliich  occurred  March  21,  1871,  when  her  youngest  sur- 
viving son,  Van  Home  Lawrence,  was  nearly  eleven  years  old.  My 
sister  Harriet  relieved  her  of  household  cares  during  her  illness,  and 
took  charge  of  her  young  brother  after  Jiis  mother's  death.  Van 
Home's  cheerful  disposition  and  merry  ways  helped  to  relieve  the 
household  gloom  at  that  time.  He  resembled  in  this,  my  own 
youngest  brother,  William,  who  had  died  January  20,  1867.  Willie, 
as  we  always  called  him,  never  had  good  health  after  early  boyhood, 
and  had  to  live  in  the  country.  He  felt  the  separation  from  the 
family  life  very  much,  and  clung  with  fond  affection  to  my  father, 
who  used  to  go  on  long  rambles  with  him.  Willie  was  the  only  one 
of  us  who  died  in  youth,  but  his  mother's  prayers  for  him  were 
granted,  as  he  became  a  Christian  and  united  with  the  church  when 
about  sixteen. 

I  have  said  that  my  stepmother  did  not,  as  far  as  I  recollect,  go 
much  into  society.  I  remember  no  balls  or  parties  given  at  tlic 
house,  and  1  think  that  she  only  occasionally  chaperoned  my  young 
sisters  to  entertainments,  or  gave  small  Christmas  parties  for  her 
boys.  My  father  never  had  any  liking  for  so-called  hospitality  of 
that  sort.  But  of  the  hospitality  which  made  his  house  a  shelter  to 
those  of  his  kin  who  needed  a  home,  his  life  was  full.  In  my 
mother's  time,  her  sister  Charlotte,  and  his  sister  Eliza  lived  with 
us  for  months  and  years.  His  brother  James  lived  with  him  in  New 
York  for  over  fifteen   years.     Uncle   James   originally  came  to  our 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  39 1 

house  after  financial  reverses  which  left  him  almost  beggared.  My 
father  found  employment  for  him,  and  he  in  time  became  a  wealthy 
man  again.  But  it  was  characteristic  of  both  brothers,  that  the  home 
shelter  was  given  and  accepted  for  all  those  years  without  a  question 
of  paying  a  cent  toward  the  household  expenses.  It  was  equally 
characteristic  of  the  silent  Scottish  nature,  that  when  Uncle  James 
died  in  Algeria,  in  1881,  he  was  found  to  have  willed  for  life  to  my 
father  a  large  sum  of  money  in  remembrance  of  his  kindness,  as 
he  explained  in  a  private  letter,  which  expressed  his  heart-felt 
gratitude. 

My  father  had  no  intimate  friends  of  his  own  age.  Probably  the 
lesson  of  self-reliance  which  his  mother  had  taught  him  after  his 
fatiier's  early  death,  made  it  more  easy  for  him  to  be  the  friend  and 
counselor  of  those  younger  than  himself.  Besides  his  brother 
James,  there  were  several  young  men  who,  entering  the  office  of  liis 
firm  as  boys,  were  trained  by  him  for  business  life.  He  realized  his 
responsibility  for  their  moral  welfare,  and  prayed  for  them  and  tried 
to  instil  into  them  his  own  simple  Christian  faith.  This  was  a  hard 
task  for  him,  as  both  by  nature  and  training  the  expression  of  Chris- 
tian sentiment  was  repugnant  to  him.  The  teaching  of  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount  had  so  enforced  the  close  personal  relation  of  Man  to 
the  Father  who  seeth  in  secret,  that  he  heartily  disliked  to  take  part 
even  in  the  publicity  of  a  church  prayer-meeting.  His  mother's 
Sandemaniau  tendencies  had  made  him  so  intolerant  of  priestly 
assumption,  and  so  convinced  of  the  equality  of  all  Christians  before 
God,  that  we  never  had  any  pastoral  visits  in  the  house.  Each  father 
of  a  family,  he  felt,  should  be  the  priest  of  his  own  household.  From 
his  mother,  too,  he  derived  so  strong  a  distaste  to  set  forms  of 
expression,  that  we  were  never  taught  the  catechism,  nor  even  the 
Apostle's  Creed.  Even  the  Lord's  Prayer  was  never  used  as  a  part 
of  family  worship  until  the  latter  part  of  his  life.  His  reticence  was 
so  difficult  for  him  to  break,  except  to  my  mother,  that  his  religious 
intercourse  with  us — apart  from  Bible  teaching — was  confined  to  the 
exchange  of  a  few  earnest  sentences  at  times  when  father  and  child 
were  deeply  moved.  It  required,  then,  a  great  effort  on  his  pan  to 
write  such  a  letter  as  the  following  to  a  young  friend  who  liad 
sought  his  counsel.  It  was  found  among  the  gentleman's  papers 
after  his  early  death,  and  1  am  permitted  by  his  family  to  copy  it  as 


392  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

an  illustration  of  the  fearless  honesty  with  which  he  would  wound 
to  heal.     "  Faithful  are  the  wounds  of  a  friend." 

"  New  York,  March  ii,  1859. 

"  My  Dear : 

"  Yours  of  4th  inst.  was  received  last  week  and  very  sad  it  made 
me,  and  had  you  been  here  when  I  got  it,  there  were  many  things 
which  I  would  have  liked  to  say,  which  I  cannot  so  well,  '  with  ink 
and  pen  write  unto  thee.'  I  have  just  dispatched  my  letters  for 
to-day's  steamer,  and  snatch  a  minute  to  say  that  I  have  got  your 
letter,  and  that  I  sympathize  with,  and  can  understand,  your  feelings, 
but  God  alone  can  minister  to  a  mind  not  diseased,  but  constituted 
as  yours  is.  '  If  they  believe  not  Moses  and  the  prophets,  neither 
will  they  believe  though  one  rose  from  the  dead.'  You  have  great 
pride  of  intellect,  somewhat  of  a  love  of  singularity,  too  much  accus- 
tomed to  command,  without,  I  suspect,  ever  having  learned  to  obey, 
crusted  all  over  with  a  certain  suspicion  of,  and  contempt  for,  your 
fellow-men,  with  perhaps  a  general  skepticism,  acquired  from  cir- 
cumstances, there  is  yet  underlying  this  mental  granite  a  deep 
vein  of  natural  religion,  which  ever  and  anon  crops  out  on  the  sur- 
face. God  in  his  own  time  and  way  will  remove  the  superin- 
cumbent mass,  and  let  in  the  light  of  his  Holy  Spirit  upon  what  is 
beneath.  There  was  one  '  who  persecuted  that  way  unto  the  death,' 
whose  mental  pride  was  not  less  than  yours,  his  learning  of  the 
highest  order  ;  in  a  moment  the  whole  current  of  his  thoughts  was 
turned,  and  he  preached  the  faith  which  once  he  destroyed.  The 
same  God  that  said  to  Paul  on  his  way  to  Damascus,  '  It  is  hard  for 
thee  to  kick  against  the  pricks,'  speaks  to  you,  not  in  one  way,  but 
in  many.  He  has  taught  you  to  feel  deeply  the  utter  worthlessness 
and  vanity  of  all  merely  earthly  pursuits  ;  worldly  ambition,  if  I  am 
not  deceived,  is  dead  within  you  ;  and  you  long  to  be  under  the 
'  shadow  of  that  great  Rock  in  a  weary  land,'  although  your  mind 
revolts  at  the  cant  or  stupidity  of  some  of  those  who  are  travelers  in 
the  same  direction.  I  know  the  feeling,  yet  if  one  candidly  scruti- 
nizes his  own  inner  life,  one  may  well  bear  with  his  fellow-men  and  all 
their  weaknesses  and  littleness.  I  feel  that  in  the  journey  of  life  I 
have  had  one  great  advantage  over  you — for  fifteen  years  the  constant 
companionship  of  one  who  really  adorned  her  Christian  profession. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABKTM    D.    KANE.  393 

"  '  'Tis  better  to  have  loved  and  lost, 
Than  never  to  have  loved  at  all.' 

"  You  talk  of  going  West  ;  that  is,  your 

"  '  soul  would  live  alone  unto  herself 
In  her  high  palace  there.' 

But  don't  you  think  it  is  a  duty  you  ovv^e  to  your  father  and  mother 
to  remain  steadily  in  Boston,  even  although  you  may  be  impatient 
with,  and  disgusted  at,  the  course  of  events  in  relation  to  some  of 
your  cherished  views,  noble  in  themselves,  but  not  to  be  further 
pushed  forward  at  this  time  ?  '  A  rolling  stone  gathers  no  moss.' 
Then,  there  are  your  younger  brothers,  to  whotn  you  have  an 
opportunity  of  setting  an  example  of  steadiness  and  sobriety  of  mind. 
Your  influence  on  them  is  vast,  for  good  or  for  evil.  It  seems  to 
me,  that  in 

"  '  The  trivial  round,  the  common  task,' 

you  have  superior  calls  to  those  which  would  lead  you  to  go  West. 
Forgive  me,  my  dear,  if  I  have  intruded  unwelcome  or  uncalled-for 
counsel.  Anything  that  I  can  say  indicates  but  very  feebly  the  deep 
interest  that  I  have  long  taken  in  your  spiritual  Avelfare.  In  your  last 
letter  you  have  very  frankly  exposed  the  state  of  your  mind  to  me, 
why  should  I  feel  ashamed  to  say  that,  the  night  after  I  got  it,  I 
lay  awake  thinking  much  of  and  praying  for  you,  with  tears  and  sup- 
plications that  He  who  in  his  infinite  mercy  had  plucked  a  wretched 
sinner  like  myself  as  a  brand  out  of  the  burning,  would  also  have 
mercy  upon  you  ?  And  He  ivill  for  the  sake  of  Him  who  died  for 
us,  and  ever  liveth  to  make  intercession  for  us. 

"Your  account  of  dear distressed  us  all,  and  I   am  specially 

commissioned  to  give  my  wife's  particular  love  to  her. 

"I  think  you  will  be  pleased  to  hear  how  J.  Walter's  recent  holi- 
days were  spent.  Information  first  reached  me  from  a  gentleman  I 
know  slightly,  and  it  was  also  told  me  in  an  omnibus.  J.  Walter's 
old  schoolmaster,  and  Willie's  present  one,  took  a  violent  fit  of  acute 
rheumatism  and  was  in  danger  of  losing  his  school,  on  which  he  is 
entirely  dependent  for  support.  He  got  a  nephew  to  carry  on  the 
school  for  one  week,  but  he  would  stay  no  longer,  and  J.  Walter 
went  and  taught  the  twenty  boys   Greek,  Latin,  etc.,  for  upward  of 


394  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

two  weeks,  and  until  Mr.  Jenks,  the  teacher,  became  convalescent. 
J.  Walter  never  told  me  until  I  asked  him,  and  I  confess  I  have 
been  more  gratified  than  by  anything  that  has  happened  to  me  for  a 
long  time. 

"  Give  my  kindest  regards  to  your  father  and  mother  and  Julia,  and 

believe  me, 

"  Ever  yours  faithfully, 

"  William  Wood. 

"  My  partner  is  still   absent  and   I   am  almost  overwhelmed  with 

work.  "  Wm.  W." 

There  was  one  clerk  whom  he  noticed  to  be  falling  into  drinking 
ways,  and  upon  whom  he  urged  total  abstinence.  On  one  occasion 
the  young  man  pleaded  the  difificulty  of  breaking  the  habit  of  years 
of  moderate  indulgence.  Father  promptly  remarked  that  he  was 
double  the  other's  age,  and  had  been  accustomed  to  his  wine  at 
dinner  from  boyhood,  and  that  he  would  join  B.  in  forswearing  it 
for  a  year.  B.  consented  and  kept  his  pledge  for  some  months, 
but  my  father  did  not  resume  his  glass  of  wine  for  much  more  than 
a  year,  not,  indeed,  until  ordered  to  do  so  by  Dr.  Barker,  when 
showing  tokens  of  ansemia  from  overwork  and  brain  exhaustion, 
fainting  twice  in  one  day. 

During  the  anti-slavery  excitement  that  preceded  the  War  of  the 
Rebellion  my  father  was  deeply  interested  in  the  efforts  of  those 
who  were  trying  to  free  the  slaves,  while  at  the  same  time  his  busi- 
ness relations  with  many  sugar-  and  cotton-planters  made  him  see 
the  difficulties  on  both  sides  of  the  question.  His  future  son-in-law, 
Thos.  L.  Kane,  resigned  a  lucrative  position  as  U.  S.  Commissioner 
rather  than  enforce  the  Fugitive  Slave  Law.  His  letter  of  resigna- 
tion was  construed  by  his  father.  Judge  Kane  of  the  Eastern  Dis- 
trict Court  of  Pennsylvania,  as  "  contempt  of  court,"  and  the  judge 
committed  him  for  it,  and  was  immediately  overruled  by  Justice 
Grier  of  the  Supreme  Court.  The  following  letter  written  on  the 
occasion  shows  my  father's  views  on  the  Slavery  Question  : 

"New  York,  October  22,  1850. 
"My  Dear  Tom  : 

"I  have  to  thank  you  for  two  letters,  one  of  September  12  and 
the  other  of  September  20-21,  the  latter  sent  under  cover  to  Walter, 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS,    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  395 

who  was  at  Fresh  Pond,  L.  I.,  from  whence  he  brought  himself  and 
your  letters  two  days  ago. 

"Before  I  go  further,  let  me  ask  if  the  resignation  of  your  United 
States  commissionership  involves  that  of  the  clerkship  in  your 
father's  court,  because,  if  so,  then  is  The  Fugitive  Slave  Law  worthy 
of  most  extra-particular  damnation.  I  hope,  however,  that  the  com- 
missionership is  only  a  subsidiary  ofifice,  and  that  its  resignation  will 
not  involve  too  heavy  a  pecuniary  sacrifice  to  principle.  I  wish  that 
a  copy  of  your  letter  of  resignation  could  be  put  into  the  news- 
papers.    It  would  aid  the  good  cause  in  various  ways. 

"  In  spite  of  my  love  of  law  and  order,  it  makes  my  blood  boil  to 
read  some  of  the  clauses  of  the  act  in  question,  and  to  read  of  the 
first  operation  of  the  act  in  this  good  city.  However,  James  Ham- 
let, or  Hallet,  will  be  back  here  from  Baltimore  in  a  week,  as  I  be- 
lieve the  sum  necessary  for  securing  his  freedom  is  made  up,  and,  I 
believe,  it  is  the  intention  of  the  law  and  order  anti-slavery  men  to 
buy  off  every  slave  who  is  captured  here  by  force  of  law,  under  the 
Algerine  act.  However,  I  expect  good  out  of  this  evil.  The 
Southern  people  will  feel  secure,  and  from  a  feverish  irritability 
against  all  schemes  for  ameliorating  the  condition  of  their  bondmen 
there  will  be  a  reaction  in  favor  of  doing  something  to  remove  the 
feeling  against  them  in  the  North,  and  a  desire  to  prove  that  when 
let  alone  they  will,  es  mero  f?iotii,  do  something  to  better  the  condi- 
tion of  the  slaves.  And  if  they  would  set-to  to  practical  reforma- 
tion, they  might,  without  hurting  their  own  pecuniary  interests  in  the 
least, — but,  on  the  contrary,  im])roving  them, — do  a  vast  deal  toward 
improving  the  condition  of  the  negro  and  toward  preparing  the  race 
for  ultimate  freedom.  Non-separation  of  families  in  sales,  facilities 
for  allowing  slaves  to  purchase  their  freedom,  taking  their  evidence 
against  whites,  etc.,  might  be  all  originated  and  carried  out  by  the 
slaveholders  themselves.  Although  the  new  law  is  rather  a  '  heavy 
blow  and  great  discouragement '  to  your  party,  yet  you  must  expect, 
even  in  a  winning  cause,  which  yours  is,  occasional  reverses  ;  and 
looking  backward  for  six  years,  that  is,  since  my  return  to  the  coun- 
try, I  can  see  a  vast  progress  made  in  an  onward  direction  by  the 
anti-slavery  section.  It  will  be  an  interesting  case,  when  the  first 
escaped  slave  shoots  his  captor.  I  asked,  yesterday,  an  editor  here 
what  he  would  do  if,  in  Algeria,  he  had  escaped  with  a  loaded  pistol 


396  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

in  his  hand  and  an  Algerian  attempted  to  recapture  him.  He  said 
it  was  a  difficult  case.  I  confess  I  did  not  see  the  difficulty.  He 
told  me,  in  reply  to  some  of  my  remarks,  that  this  act  was  merely 
carrying  on  an  agreement  between  the  North  and  South  made  by 
the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  and  to  that  bargain  he,  for 
one,  thought  it  right  and  just  to  adhere.  That  was  all  very  well,  as 
between  the  whites  of  the  North  and  South,  but  the  negroes  were  no 
party  to  the  original  agreement,  or  any  bargain  or  arrangement  that 
flows  out  of  it,  and,  therefore,  I  hold  that  they  have  an  inalienable 
right  to  free  themselves,  and  keep  free,  whenever  they  have  a 
chance,  although  I  doubt  if  the  Northern  whites,  so  long  as  the 
Union  exists,  have  a  right  to  assist  them. 

"  By  a  law  of  the  State  of  South  Carolina  no  free  black  can  come 
into  that  State,  whether  he  be  a  citizen  or  a  foreigner,  or  if  he  do 
he  is  put  in  jail  and  kept  there.  Now,  if  South  Carolina  can  pass 
such  a  law  in  relation  to  free  citizens  of  the  free  States,  why  cannot 
one  or  all  of  the  free  States  pass  laws  for  themselves  by  which, 
whenever  a  slave  touches  their  soil,  'he  stands  redeemed,  regener- 
ated, and  disenthralled  by  the  spirit  of  universal  emancipation  '  ? 
This  question  may  only  show  my  crass  '  Europyean  '  ignorance  '  of 
our  domestic  institootions,'  but  I  can't  see  why,  if  a  slave  State  can 
pass  laws  against  freedom  within  its  borders,  a  free  State  cannot  pass 
laws  in  favor  of  freedom  within  its  boundaries.  Now,  if  Pennsyl- 
vania, Ohio,  and  Michigan  would  pass  such  laws  you  would  bother 
the  Southerners.  They  could  not  bring  their  servants,  as  they  love 
to  call  them  (not  slaves,  being  creditably  ashamed  of  the  name,  at 
least,  if  not  of  the  thing),  to  the  North  with  them  except  by  sea,  and 
all  the  fugitives  would  be  safe  in  those  States,  and  yet  there  would 
be  no  federal  movement  of  the  North  against  the  Soutli. 

"  You  have  got  a  stop  put  to  slave  trading  in  the  District  of 
Columbia.  When  I  came  here  in  1844  I  think  you  could  not  even 
present  a  petition  against  slavery  in  the  House  of  Representatives. 
That  itself  indicated  a  considerable  jump  in  the  right  direction. 
The  Liberian  colonization  is,  I  think,  going  to  produce  much  greater 
results  than  have  been  anticipated.  That,  combined  with  a  system 
under  proper  checks,  for  carrying  \?Coox  fj-om  Africa  to  your  South- 
ern States  and  our  West  India  Islands  ;  there  to  undergo  a  certain 
degree  of  civilization,  before  said  labor  is  reconveyed  to  Africa,  will 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  397 

in  time  work  an  end  of  the  slave  trade  and  slavery,  and  I  don't  see 
anything  else  that  will. 

"  I  rejoice,  for  your  sake,  that  you  are  getting  your  appointments 
for  the  Government  of  the  Western  Territories  carried  out  as  you 
wish.  You  may  live  to  see  your  efforts  for  the  freedom  of  the 
negro  also  crowned  with  success  in  these  latter  days.  Events  which 
hitherto  have  taken  the  slow  process  of  ages  to  mature  seem  to 
crystallize  into  form  almost  on  the  instant. 

"  I  hear  to-day,  from  'one  who  knows,'  that  after  the  next  elec- 
tion there  will  not  be  so  much  as  a  Whig  cat  to  mew  about  any  public 
office  in  this  country  for  the  next  twenty  years,  and,  further,  that 
Cass  is  to  be  your  man.  Now,  from  your  old  friendship  v/ith  Cass, 
can't  you  use  him  to  promote  your  own  schemes,  and  instead  of 
standing  aloof  from  your  old  political  associates,  join  them  and 
get  them  to  run  in  your  groove.  Use  your  party  to  aid  you, 
instead  of  throwing  it  out  of  the  saddle  because  it  did  not  walk 
precisely  in  the  narrow  road.  If  you  mounted  behind  old  Cass 
you  could  manage  to  guide  his  horse,  perhaps,  where  you  wanted 
to  go,  M'hich  you  may  not  be  able  to  do  if  you  knock  him  out  of 
the  saddle. 

"  Charlotte  is  at  Dosoris  and  benefiting  by  the  change  of  air. 
Mrs.  Wood  and  Bessie  have  had  bad  colds. 

"  Kind  love  to  your  father,  mother,  and  Bessie. 

"God  love  and  keep  you. 

"  Yours  faithfully, 

"William  Wood." 

Father's  family  used  often  to  wonder  why  a  man  who  was  entirely 
outside  of  politics,  and  chiefly  known  in  New  York  for  his  honesty 
and  independence,  should  have  been  put  in  office  by  the  "  Tweed 
Ring."  We  concluded  that  they  had  thought  he  would  make  a 
conspicuous  figurehead,  and  that,  while  the  Ring  could  claim  credit 
for  placing  him,  his  single  vote  and  influence  could  be  easily  over- 
ridden. I  wrote  to  him  in  1870,  asking  him  if  he  had  been  person- 
ally acquainted  with  the  members  of  the  Ring  before  his  appoint- 
ment to  the  Department  of  Docks,  and  in  reply  he  gave  me  the 
following  account  of  his  first  interview  with  them.  It  is  dated 
May  2,  1870  : 


39S  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

"  I  believe  I  told  you  I  was  on  the  Executive  Committee  of  the 
Department  of  Docks,  and  as  such,  in  order  to  arrange  with  the 
heads  of  the  Democratic  party  as  to  our  subordinate  officers,  I  was 
asked  to  meet  with  the  other  two  members  of  the  Executive  Com- 
mittee (Wilson  G.  Hunt  and  Hugh  Smith),  and  our  chairman,  Mr. 
Agnevv  (who  is  ex-officio  member  of  all  committees),  the  heads  of 
the  Democratic  party  at  Peter  B.  Sweeny's,  140  West  Thirty-fourth 
Street.  Well,  behold  your  worthy  father  closeted  with  P.  B.  S., 
Wm.  M.  Tweed,  Mayor  Hall,  and  Comptroller  R.  B.  Connolly — in 
fact,  the  heads  of  the  '  Tammany  Ring  '  !  I  did  not  even  tell 
Margaret  where  I  was  going,  and  poor  Chalmers,  with  his  ardent 
Republican  ideas,  would  as  lief  have  had  me  go  to  the  devil  direct. 
Now,  I  want,  as  a  student  of  human  nature,  to  tell  you  just  what  I 
felt  and  saw.  Peter  B.  Sweeny  is  a  man  of  education  and  of  great 
ability,  head  and  shoulders  above  them  all,  and  I  saw  he  did  just 
exactly  what  I  have  often  done  in  managing  meetings,  to  get  what 
I  myself  wanted  done.  He  took  his  pen,  ink,  and  paper  and  went 
to  work,  and  held  them  to  the  work  in  hand  and  did  it,  and  did  it  in 
a  gentlemanly  and  yet  decided  way.  Wm.  M.  Tweed  is  a  large, 
fat  man,  of  almost  Falstaffian  proportions,  and  with  that  trouble  in  his 
eye  which  might  indicate  visits  to  the  Boar's  Head  at  East  Cheap, 
and  his  prototype's  apostrophe  : 

"  '  If  sack  and  sugar  be  a  sin,  then help  the  wicked.' 

*'  Mayor  Hall  is  also  an  educated,  gentlemanly  man  ;  Richard 
Connolly,  an  Irishman  of  about  fifty  or  fifty-five,  with  a  very  Irish 
face  and  merry  twinkle  in  his  eye.  I  liked  all  of  them  excepting 
Tweed,  and  I  could  hardly  judge  of  him.  Peter  B.  Sweeny  is,  in 
fact,  the  Democratic  leader  of  the  United  States,  and  makes  mayors 
and  governors,  and  probably  will  nominate  the  next  Democratic 
President.  He  is  a  bachelor,  has  a  nice  house,  and  his  brother,  a 
stouter  and  older-looking  man,  who  goes  by  the  name  of  the 
'  Colonel,'  lives  with  him.  P.  B.  S.  is  about  forty-five,  very,  very 
sharp,  said  to  be  a  conscientious  Catholic,  and  perfectly  pure  in  his 
character,  quite  wealthy  and  siii  profusus,  but  not  alietii  appetens, 
and  has  a  love  of  power  and  organization.  I  thought  they  dealt 
very  liberally  about  the  appointments,  which  were  all  fixed  there, 
although   they  will  only  be  passed  by  the  Board  of  Docks  to-day. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  399 

Most  of  them  smoked  cigars  ;  no  wine  or  whisky,  simply  smoke  and 
business.  By  the  way,  Connolly,  in  a  sort  of  joking  way,  opened 
the  business  by  reading  a  resolution  of  the  Sinking  Fund  Commit- 
tee to  the  effect  that  each  of  the  Commissioners  of  Docks  was  to 
have  a  salary  of  $ro,ooo,  beginning  from  May  i,  1870,  which  is 
very  handsome,  and  as  high  as  the  salary  of  any  city  functionary, 
and  $6000  more  than  Governor  Hoffman  gets  (which  is  scandal- 
ous). Even  the  Commissioners  of  Public  Charities  and  Correc- 
tions, a  most  important  and  onerous  commission,  only  get  $7500 
each,  and  so  the  Democratic  party  have  certainly  treated  us  very 
handsomely. 

"  Yesterday  we  borrowed  the  steamer  from  the  Commissioners  of 
Charities  and  Corrections,  and  made  the  tour  of  the  docks  from 
Harlem  Bridge,  East  River,  to  Sixtieth  Street,  North  River.  We 
had,  besides  four  dock  commissioners,  Isaac  Bell,  J.  B.  Nicholson, 
and  Lincoln  Trea,  of  the  Charities  Commission  ;  Peter  Cooper  and 
a  Herald  and  Sun  reporter,  and  we  had  a  good  lunch,  with  cham- 
pagne, etc.,  etc.;  a  fine  trip  and  good  day  ;  all  reported  in  the 
Herald,  etc.  Bell  and  I  landed  at  Canal  Street,  and  made  for  the 
hall  of  the  Board  of  Education,  where  we  voted  for  the  expulsion 
of  a  ward  trustee,  who  is  also  a  member  of  the  Assembly,  for  taking 
a  bribe  of  one  hundred  dollars  from  a  school-teacher  to  procure  a 
situation,  etc.,  and  so  home.  On  Tuesday  night  I  went  to  bed  at 
ir.30  and  got  up  at  5.30  next  morning,  never  having  closed  an  eye 
all  night.  However,  I  am  all  right  now.  With  kind  love  to  Tom, 
H.  A.  K.  (what  a  clever  imitation  of  Eliza  that  was  !),  Elisha,  Evan, 
and  Willie.     God  bless  you  all. 

"  Ever  your  affectionate  father, 

"  William  Wood." 

When  my  father  was  appointed  a  member  of  the  Board  of  Educa- 
tion in  1869,  he  was  one  of  the  three  men  who  were  understood  to 
be  recommended  by  the  Citizens'  Reform  Associaiton.  The  others 
were  Nathaniel  Sands  and  John  H.  Sherwood.  A  reorganization 
of  the  board  had  taken  place  by  act  of  the  legislature,  by  which  it 
was  enacted  that  twelve  commissioners  should  be  appointed  by  the 
mayor. 

They  appear  to  have  gone  to  work  speedily  to  adapt  the  work  U> 


400  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

be  done  to  the  reduced  number  of  commissioners  who  were  to  per- 
form it,  twelve  instead  of  twenty-one,  and  as  new  brooms  to  sweep 
clean  wherever  their  predecessors  had  left  a  necessity  for  such  action. 

Richard  Larremore  was  re-elected  president,  Commissioner 
Wood  receiving  Mr.  Larremore's  vote.  In  the  minutes  of  the  first 
meeting,  I  find  a  resolution  passed  abolishing  the  Department  of 
Buildings  and  Repairs,  removing  the  superintendent,  and  repealing 
the  resolution  making  his  salary  five  thousand  dollars,  while  the 
assistant  superintendent  was  directed  to  perform  the  duties  here- 
tofore devolving  upon  his  superior. 

Another  resolution  reads  : 

''Resolved,  That  the  tearoom  in  the  hall  of  the  Board  of  Educa- 
tion, and  the  practice  of  furnishing  suppers  and  refreshments  to  the 
members  of  the  board  at  the  expense  of  the  School  Fund,  be  and 
the  same  are  hereby  abolished." 

Again  : 

''Resolved,  That  a  special  committee  of  four  be  appointed  to 
inquire  into  the  system  by  which  supplies  have  heretofore  been  fur- 
nished, and  the  amount  of  such  now  on  hand,  including  what  is 
known  as  '  the  shop.'  " 

And  again  : 

"  Whereas,  Large  sums  of  money  have  been  appropriated  and 
expended  by  the  late  board  as  incidental  expenses  :  therefore 

"  Resolved,  That  the  cleik  of  this  board,  as  soon  as  practicable, 
furnish  a  complete  list  of  all  the  items  included  in  and  charged  to 
the  account  of  '  incidental  expenses.'  " 

With  a  board  in  this  mood,  the  work  of  the  finance  committee 
was  likely  to  be  of  great  importance. 

Before  adjourning,  the  appointment  of  the  committees  was 
announced,  and  the  members  of  the  finance  committee  were  Com- 
missioners Bell,  Murphy,  Wood,  Brennan,  and  Lewis.  Their  reports 
at  each  meeting  of  the  board  show  hard  work  done.  In  the  general 
work  of  the  board  reported,  I  find  resolutions  of  Commissioner 
Wood  occasionally,  in  which  he  appears  to  have  been  in  the  min- 
ority— such  for  instance  as  this  : 

"Resolved,  That  the  nine  committees  of  the  board  be  recon- 
structed, and  that  in  appointing  their  chairman  the  rights  of  the 
minority  be  respected." 


COiNTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  4OI 

The  chairman  put  the  question  whether  the  board  would  agree 
with  said  resolution,  and  it  was  decided  in  the  negative. 

Commissioner  Sands  then  moved  tliat  the  vote  just  taken  be 
reconsidered,  by  count. 

The  i^resident  put  the  question  whether  the  board  would  agree 
with  said  motion  to  reconsider,  and,  five  members  voting  in  favor 
thereof  and  six  against,  it  was  decided  in  the  negative. 

The  bald  record  gives  no  more  than  a  hint  of  what  was  probably 
a  lively  fight.  It  may  have  been  on  this  occasion  tliat  a  friend  re- 
ports Mr.  Wood  as  jumping  to  his  feet  and  saying  that  lie  and  his 
two  fellow-commissioners  of  the  Reform  Association  were  like 
Shadrach,  Meshach,  and  Abednego  in  the  fiery  furnace,  and  that 
Mayor  Hall  was  the  Nebuchadnezzar  who  had  cast  them  in.  The 
three  were  in  a  hopeless  minority. 

One  resolution  of  his  offering,  after  being  referred  to  the  Com- 
mittee on  By-Laws,  and  approved  by  them,  was  adopted.  Its 
adoption  implies  that  previous  to  that  time  no  regular  system  of 
visiting  the  schools  had  been  enforced  upon  the  commissioners: 

"  Resolved,  That  the  Grammar,  Primary,  and  Colored  Schools  of  the 
City  and  County  of  New  York  be  divided,  as  nearly  as  may  be,  into 
twelve  equal  groups,  the  schools  in  each  group  being  indicated  by 
their  numbers  on  twelve  separate  pieces  of  paper,  and  that  each 
commissioner  draw  one  of  said  pieces  of  paper,  and  it  shall  be  his 
duty  to  visit  the  schools  named  therein,  between  the  istof  January 
and  the  30th  of  June,  1870;  that  after  next  December,  on  the  last 
stated  meeting  of  the  board  in  June  and  December,  beginning  in 
June,  1870,  tlie  president  allot  one  of  the  groups  of  the  schools  to 
each  commissioner,  but  in  such  a  way  that  no  one  commissioner 
shall  visit  the  same  group  of  schools  twice  within  the  same  year. 
Nothing  in  this  resolution  shall  be  construed  as  preventing  any 
commissioner  from  visiting  as  many  schools  as  he  chooses  over  and 
above  his  own  allotted  group." 

Whatever  the  other  commissioners  may  have  done.  Commissioner 
Wood  availed  himself  of  the  privilege  conferred  in  the  last  clause  : 
"  Nothing  in  this  resolution  shall  be  construed  as  preventing  any 
commissioner  from  visiting  as  many  schools  as  he  chooses  over  and 
above  his  own  allotted  group."  From  that  time  he  devoted  a  large 
part  of  the  school  term  of  each  year  to   visiting  the  schools.     Presi- 


402  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF     WILLIAM     WOOD. 

dent  Hunter  of  the  Normal  College  says  :  "  While  Commissioner 
and  President  of  tlie  Board  of  Education,  he  not  only  visited  his 
own  group  of  schools  but  also  every  school  in  the  city,  and  not  only 
every  school,  but  every  classroom  in  every  school.  He  was  by  far 
the  most  efficient  commissioner  that  New  York  ever  had.  In  fact, 
he  never  spared  himself  when  he  had  a  duty  to  perform." 

This  faithful  visiting  of  the  schools  made  Commissioner  Wood 
familiar  with  the  most  remote  districts  of  the  city.  In  the  early 
days  of  his  service  the  schools  in  the  upper  end  of  the  island  were 
hard  to  reach,  and  he  sometimes  lost  his  way  among  the  truck 
patches,  marshy  flats,  and  newly  begun  streets  of  Harlem.  He  had 
made  himself  thoroughly  familiar  with  the  history  of  the  island,  and 
enjoyed  taking  one  of  us  with  him  and  pointing  out  among  the 
market  gardens  the  sites  of  the  country  places  of  old  friends  of  my 
mother's  youth,  such  as  Colonel  Thorn's  and  Colonel  Monroe's,  and 
showing  the  grouj)  of  thirteen  trees  for  the  first  thirteen  States  on 
the  old  Hamilton  place,  and  how  near  neighbors  Hamilton  and  Burr 
had  been  ;  the  road  they  probably  followed  down  the  hill — some- 
where near  where  Grant's  tomb  is  now  it  must  have  been — to 
take  boat  for  the  fatal  duel  at  Weehawken.  Another  especially 
interesting  part  of  the  city  to  him  was  the  squalid,  thickly  populated 
district  of  which  Grand  Street  forms  the  showiest  part. 

When  their  freedom  first  made  the  colored  population  of  New 
York  eager  to  advance  themselves  to  equality  with  white  citizens, 
Commissioner  Wood  was  delighted  with  the  intelligence  and  ease  in 
acquiring  knowledge  of  the  negro  children  v,dio  thronged  the  schools. 
He  was  proportionately  disappointed  as  years  v/ent  on  to  find  their 
parents  withdrawing  them  on  trivial  pretexts  in  order  to  use  their 
labor  at  home  or  wherever  they  could  get  employment  for  them. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  Scottish  prejudice  against  the  Jewish  race 
gradually  gave  way  to  what  was  at  first  a  half-unwilling  admiration 
of  the  bright  intelligence  and  persevering  industry  of  the  Jewish 
pupils  in  the  schools. 

He  used  laughingly  to  point  out,  in  proof  of  the  wisdom  of  the 
expenditure  made  in  founding  and  carrying  on  the  Normal  College, 
the  yearly  increasing  proportion  of  Hebrew  names  on  the  college 
roll.  Jews  knew  what  they  were  about,  he  would  say,  and  how  to 
avail   themselves  of   the   magnificent   training   which    they  had   the 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  403 

right  to  obtain  for   their  daughters.     The   honor  lists  showed   how 
their  daughters  appreciated  their  opportunities. 

From  the  Public  School  Journal  of  Saturday,  February  4,  187 1,  I 
take  a  description  of  father's  personal  appearance  and  character- 
istics at  this  time,  which  is  good  : 

"  Since  Mr.  Wood's  name  has  become  a  household  word  among  the 
parents  of  the  children  who  attend  the  public  schools,  it  may  not  be 
out  of  place  to  describe,  even  though  faintly,  his  mental,  moral,  and 
physical  characteristics.  His  whole  organization  is  highly  nervous, 
imparting  a  vitality  and  a  force  which  keeps  him  ever  active  and 
energetic.  What  he  does,  therefore,  he  does  with  all  his  might.  To 
him  in  every  question  there  is  a  right  and  a  wrong,  a  true  and  a 
false  ;  and  when  he  has  taken  his  side  for  what  he  considers  the 
truth,  you  might  as  well  endeavor  to  change  the  stars  in  their  courses 
as  to  drive  him  from  his  position.  By  temperament  and  education 
he  is  very  courageous — sometimes  impulsive,  and  always  courteous. 
His  intellectual  abilities  are  of  a  very  high  order.  His  mind  is  at 
the  same  time  acute  and  comprehensive,  capable  of  taking  in  the 
smallest  details  and  of  grasping  the  greatest  principles.  His  per- 
ception is  keen  and  thorough,  and  yet  separate  items  of  fact  are 
welded  with  great  skill  into  a  unit  of  purpose  precisely  as  many 
little  tributaries  form  the  mighty  river.  His  apprehension  is  so 
quick  that  he  very  often  not  only  seizes  the  salient  points,  but  actu- 
ally anticipates  the  underlying  truths  of  a  proposition.  His  mem- 
ory, as  we  mentioned  before,  is  prodigious,  and  his  acquirements 
many  and  varied.  He  has  ranged  through  the  fields  of  classic  lore, 
natural  science,  history,  political  economy,  and  literature  ;  and  still, 
with  all  his  knowledge,  he  is  humble  as  a  child  and  chivalrous  as  a 
knight  of  old.  The  very  soul  of  honor,  he  never  seeks  the  accom- 
plishment of  an  end  by  artifice  or  indirection.  He  goes  straight  for 
the  object,  and,  to  use  a  favorite  expression  of  his  own,  'takes  the 
bull  by  the  horns.'  It  is  needless  to  say  that  Mr.  Wood  is  a  man  of 
great  integrity  and  purity  of  character,  and  governed  in  all  his  actions 
by  a  strict  sense  of  duty. 

"A  likeness  can  give  but  a  faint  idea  of  a  man's  personal  appear- 
ance. Even  a  pen  and  ink  sketch  can  hardly  suffice  to  paint  any- 
thing like  a  good  picture.     Mr.  Wood  is  tall,  erect,  and  compactly 


404  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

knit,  with  broad,  strong  shoulders,  surmounted  by  a  head  cast  in 
the  antique  mold.  The  hair  and  flowing  beard  are  snow  white,  im- 
parting a  patriarchal  aspect  to  the  face,  which  is  ruddy  and  clear, 
and  indicative  of  good  health.  His  brow  is  broad,  rather  than  high, 
and  the  brain,  largely  developed  at  the  base,  shows  executive  facul- 
ties of  a  high  order.  The  eye  is  a  sort  of  hazel,  quick,  sharp,  and 
penetrating  in  its  glance  ;  but  when  lighted  up  by  inherent  humor 
the  expression  changes  to  one  of  great  kindness  and  good  nature. 
The  nose  is  large  and  well-formed,  evincing  strength  of  character  ; 
while  the  mouth,  or  what  can  be  seen  of  it,  denotes  firmness  and 
resolution.  The  chin,  however,  is  a  terra  incognita,  and  so  we  are 
unable  to  tell  whether  it  is  square  or  rounded,  dimpled  or  project- 
ing ;  we  only  know  that  it  cannot  be  retreating." 

I  find  that  my  father's  name  is  on  the  Committee  on  Normal, 
Colored,  and  Evening  Schools  in  187 1.  Prior  to  1870  there  was  no 
regular  normal  instruction  provided  for  those  desirous  to  become 
teachers,  and  but  very  little  for  teachers.  Education  in  the  higher 
branches  of  knowledge  was  limited  to  the  so-called  supplementary 
classes  of  the  public  schools  and  to  the  Saturday  "^Normal"  School, 
wliich  simply  furnished  high  school  instruction. 

The  humble  beginning  of  the  Normal  College  was  in  the  building 
on  the  southeast  corner  of  Broadway  and  Fourth^Street.  Sixteen 
recitation  rooms,  about  the  size  of  the  ordinary  public  school  class- 
rooms, needed  little  alteration,  and  were  rapidly  supplied  with  the 
necessary  furniture.  A  large  assembly  hall  was  divided  into  eight 
rooms  by  means  of  curtains,  which  was  worked"  somewhat  after  the 
manner  of  a  ship's  sails,  and  by  sliding  doors. 

"On  the  14th  day  of  February,  1870,  the  supplementary  classes 
of  the  public  schools  sought  admission  to  the  College."* 

Father's  time  was  largely  occupied  in  his  committee  and  school 
work,  but  he  occasionally  found  time  to   make  an  address  on  some 

*  These  words  from  President  Hunter's  report,  dated  December  29,  l8qi,  I  am 
writing  on  February  15,  1895.  Last  night  in  the  cit}'  of  New  York,  the  Associate 
Alumnte  of  the  Normal  College  gave  him  a  reception  in  commemoration  of  his 
twenty-fifth  anniversary  as  president,  and  of  the  founding  of  'the  college.  What 
pleasure  it  would  have  given  my  father  to  be  present  on  this  occasion''  within  the 
stately  walls  of  the  college  on  Sixty-eighth  Street  and  Park  Avenue  !     The  twenty- 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  405 

topic  of  public  interest.  The  Scottish  American  of  August  17,  1871, 
says  : 

"the    SCOTT    CENTENARY. LAYING    OF    THE    FOUNDATION 

STONE    OF    THE    STATUE    IN    THE    CENTRAL    PARK. 

"  On  Tuesday  last,  a  day — the  centennial  birthday  of  our  most 
illustrious  countryman,  Sir  Walter  Scott — was  celebrated,  which  will 
ever  stand  out  clear  in  the  remembrance  of  all  Scotsmen.  While 
accounts  had  been  reaching  ns  of  the  innumerable  tributes  which 
were  being  paid  in  Scotland  and  elsewhere  to  the  memory  of  the 
greatest  of  Scotsmen,  measures  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic  were 
being  matured  to  render  the  celebration  here  worthy  of  the  great 
occasion.  To  say  that  the  matter  was  taken  up  with  enthusiasm  is 
to  speak  simply  of  a  feeling  as  fervent  as  widespread. 

"  It  is  now  some  time  since  a  special  committee  was  organized  to 
erect  a  monument  to  Sir  Walter  Scott,  but  although  the  result  of 
their  labors — the  laying  of  the  foundation  stone — was  the  grand 
feature  of  Tuesday's  proceedings,  the  different  Scotch  societies 
throughout  the  country  had  entered  into  the  celebration  with  such 
spirit  that,  in  treating  of  the  ceremonial  in  Central  Park,  we  allude 
to  only  one  part  of  a  jubilee  universal  among  our  countrymen.  The 
different  Scottish  societies  in  the  vicinity  each  contributed  to  the 
movement,  and  notably  the  St.  Andrew's  Society  and  the  Caledonian 
Club,  which  had  extended  an  invitation  to  all  sister  societies  to  be 
present.  Under  the  direction  of  the  committee  presiding  over  the 
general  movement,  the  plan  was  formed  to  have  a  grand  pageant  to 
the  park,  and  there  cause  the  different  societies  to  gather  together 
round  the  site  chosen  for  the  monument  and  unite  in  the  ceremonial 
of  laying  the  stone.  With  regard  to  the  monument  it  may  be  said 
that  it  is  a  testimony,  and  that  exclusively,  of  the  devotion  of  our 
coutrymen  to  the  memory  of  the  '  Great  Unknown.'  We  have 
already  intimated  that  the  statue  is  to  be  executed  by  John  Steell  of 
Edinburgh,  after   the  one  in  the  monument   in   his  '  own   romantic 

five  years  of  hard  work  and  honorable  service  of  President  Hunter  were  also 
twenty-five  years  of  increasing  friendship  and  mutual  esteem  between  him  and  my 
father.  If  Dr.  Hunter  has  been  the  Moses  of  the  long  struggle  for  the  higher 
education  of  women,  my  father  sustained  him  with  the  untiring  zeal  of  both  Aaron 
and  Hur  ! 


406  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

town,'  and  those  who  have  seen  and  studied  the  original  will  know 
that  the  monument  here,  when  the  day  comes  for  it  to  be  unveiled, 
will  not  be  the  least  beautiful  ornament  of  the  Central  Park.  It  will 
be  a  source  of  gratification  and  pardonable  pride  in  Scotsmen  to 
point  to  the  statue  as  a  proof  that  here,  in  a  strange  land,  they  have 
yet  a  warm  love  for  their  country  and  their  country's  gods,  as  a 
monument  executed  by  a  Scotsman,  raised  by  Scotsmen,  to  the 
greatest  of  all  Scotsmen." 

ADDRESS   BY    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  J/r.  Mayor,  Mr.  President,  Ladies,  and  Gentlemen  :  The  too  par- 
tial choice  of  my  native  countrymen  has  devolved  upon  me  the  high 
honor  of  addressing  you  regarding  him  who  has  made  this  day  hon- 
orable for  all  succeeding  time,  not  only  in  the  country  of  his  birth, 
but  among  all  the  countries  of  the  English-speaking  races — and  on 
their  wide  expanse  the  sun  never  sets.  Conscious  of  my  own  ina- 
bility to  do  justice  to  my  theme,  and  feeling  that  this  sacred  trust 
has  been  confided  to  me  solely  owing  to  the  accident  of  my  birth, 
I  hope  that  you  will  bear  with  me,  should  I  fail  to  rise  to  the  height 
of  the  great  argument,  which  it  is  to-day  my  duty  to  illustrate  and 
set  forth  to  the  best  of  my  humble  ability. 

"This  day  one  hundred  years  ago  a  child  was  born  to  our  Scottish 
Israel,  in  a  narrow  wynd  of  '  Auld  Reekie,'  who  was  to  prove 
beyond  compare  the  greatest  of  our  race — a  race  which,  though 
small  in  numbers,  has  been  rendered  illustrious  by  theologians,  by 
philosophers,  by  poets,  by  many  a  hero,  and  by  many  a  statesman — 
but  he,  the  centenary  of  whose  birth  we  this  day  celebrate,  was  of 
them  all  without  a  peer  among  the  greatest  of  his  countrymen,  and 
was  and  ever  will  be  to  our  beloved  Scotland  what  Shakspeare,  and 
Shakspeare  alone,  is  to  England.  Let  us  look  at  the  condition  of 
the  world  and  society  when  Scott  made  his  appearance  on  this 
sphere  of  ours.  Do  not  be  alarmed  that  I  am  going  to  '  survey 
mankind  from  China  to  Peru'  ;  I  merely  mean  to  take  a  brief  view 
of  the  condition  of  affairs  in  a  few  of  the  leading  countries  of  the 
world  that  we  may  better  comprehend  the  circumstances  under 
which  Scott's  infant  and  boyish  mind  was  molded,  and  which 
tended  to  influence  his  conduct  through  life. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  407 

"George  III.  had  reigned  over  the  United  Kingdom  and  the 
American  Colonies  for  about  eleven  years.  He  had  just  taken  Lord 
North  as  Prime  Minister,  who  was  to  preside  over  the  destinies 
of  the  United  Kingdom  for  the  next  twelve  years,  perhaps  the  most 
important  of  its  important  history.  Charles  James  Fox  was  in 
Parliament,  and,  although  only  twenty-two,  was  beginning  to  take  a 
leading  part  in  its  debates.  The  Earl  of  Chatham,  after  having 
retired  from  public  life  on  account  of  bad  health,  returned  in  1771 
with  renewed  health  and  to  active  opposition  to  the  ministry 
of  the  day  ;  and  his  celebrated  son,  the  second  William  Pitt, 
was,  when  Scott  was  born,  a  precocious  boy  of  twelve  years 
old.  John  Wilkes  was  M.  P.  for  Middlesex,  and  wielding  great 
political  power,  and  in  that  very  year  he  and  his  associates  gained  a 
great  triumph  for  the  liberty  of  the  press  by  virtually  winning,  after 
great  opposition,  the  power  to  report  debates  in  Parliament.  Spain 
had  just  ceded  the  Falkland  Islands  to  Great  Britain,  after  tlireat- 
ening  war  to  re-obtain  possession  of  them,  but  Mme.  du  Barr}/-,  the 
infamous  mistress  of  Louis  XV.,  persuaded  her  royal  lover  not  to 
assist  Spain,  and  without  the  aid  of  France  Spain  felt  that  she  was 
unequal  to  the  combat  with  Great  Britain,  and  therefore  sullenly 
submitted  to  the  loss  of  her  possessions.  Our  countryman,  Lord 
Mansfield,  was  Lord  Chief  Justice  of  England,  and  another  coun- 
tryman, Alex.  Wedderburn  (subsequently  Lord  Chancellor  Lough- 
borough) had  just  been  made  Solicitor  General,  with  Thurlow  as 
Attorney  General,  and  David  Hume  as  Under-Secretary  of  State. 
James  Watt  had  two  years  before  completed  his  first  steam  engine. 
And  two  of  the  heads  of  the  rebels  of  1745,  those  of  Fletcher  and 
Townley,  were  still  on  Temple  Bar  (one  of  the  two  fell  off  in  April, 
1772).  Junius  was  in  the  height  of  his  celebrity.  Our  countryman, 
James  Boswell,  the  foolishest  of  men  and  best  of  biographers,  was 
toadying  Dr.  Johnson  and  laying  up  materials  for  his  immortal 
biography.  Dr.  Johnson  was  chaffing  Boswell  about  buying  the 
remotest  of  the  Hebrides,  St.  Kilda,  and  promising,  if  he  did,  that 
he  would  go  and  spend  a  winter  with  him  there,  which  promise  two 
years  afterward  resulted  in  the  voyage  to  the  Hebrides.  This  pur- 
chase of  St.  Kilda  had  been  a  favorite  scheme  of  Boswell's,  and 
several  years  before  he  had  spoken  on  the  subject  to  Voltaire  at 
Ferney,  who  asked  Boswell  if  he  intended  him  to  go  there,  if  he  did 


408  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

not,  he  might  buy  St.  Kilda,  but  for  his  own  part  he  would  as  soon 
go  to  the  North  Pole. 

"  No  anticipation  of  the  upheavals  of  society  which  were  to  take 
place  during  the  next  twenty  years  seems  to  have  disturbed  the 
general  mind.  '  A  storm  was  coming,  but  the  wind  was  still.'  In 
the  midst  of  this  uneventful  time,  this  transition  period  between  the 
old  and  the  7ieiv,  Walter  Scott  was  born,  a  healthy  boy,  the  son  of 
Walter  Scott,  Writer  to  the  Signet  in  Edinburgh,  and  Anne  Ruther- 
ford, his  wife  ;  with  nothing  particular  about  him,  only  having  a 
sound  mind  in  a  sound  body  ;  but  before  he  was  two  years  old,  a 
teething  fever,  in  some  way  or  other,  produced  a  lameness  of  his 
right  leg.  from  which  he  never  recovered,  and  his  venerable  mater- 
nal grandfather.  Dr.  Rutherford,  prescribed  country  air  for  the 
boy,  and  he  was  sent  off  to  Sandy  Knowe,  the  farm  of  his  pater- 
nal grandfather,  Robert  Scott,  who,  beginning  life  as  a  sailor,  got 
so  thoroughly  disgusted  with  the  sea  from  shipwreck  on  his  first 
voyage  that  he  gave  up  the  profession,  much  to  his  father,  old 
Beardie's,  wrath  and  indignation,  and  took  the  farm  of  Sandy 
Knowe,  Peebleshire,  on  his  own  responsibility,  borrowing  tliirty 
pounds  from  an  old  shepherd  to  stock  it.  His  shepherd  and  he 
went  to  buy  the  sheep  for  Sandy  Knowe,  but  while  the  shepherd 
looked  after  the  sheep,  the  farmer,  influenced  by  his  Border  blood, 
had  spent  the  thirty  pounds  in  buying  a  fine  hunter,  much  to  the 
shepherd's  dismay.  However,  a  few  days  after,  he  rode  the  horse 
so  well  to  the  hounds  that  he  sold  him  on  the  field  for  sixty 
pounds,  and  the  farm  was  thus  in  the  end  well  stocked  Avith 
sheep.  Farmer  Robert  Scott  marked  the  lowest  point  of  depres- 
sion of  the  fortunes  of  the  family  of  our  great  poet,  for  before 
his  daythey  had  belonged  to  the  Scottish  aristocracy,  and  with 
the  poet's  father,  Walter  Scott,  Writer  to  the  Signet,  the  son  of 
Farmer  Robert,  they  began  again  to  ascend  the  social  scale.  The 
Scotts  were  poor,  but  of  '  gentle  blood,'  and  there  is  a  marked  dif- 
ference in  this  respect  between  Scotland  and  England.  Scotland 
never  had  a  yeomanry  class  ;  the  people  were  either  'gentle  '  or  '  sim- 
ple,' that  is,  either  belonging,  though  poor,  to  the  gentry  ;  or 
'  simple,'  that  is,  belonging  to  peasantry  ;  and  however  poor  the 
former  class  might  be,  they  had  altogether  a  different  social  position 
from  the  *  peasantry,'  or  from  what   their  poverty  would   have  con- 


CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  409 

demned  them  to  in  England.  Young  Waller  improved  in  health  at 
Sandy  Knowe  but  slowly,  and  began  early  to  imbibe  a  taste  for  old 
tales  and  ballads  of  the  Border,  and  to  have  aristocratic  and  anti- 
popular  feelings. 

"  In  r779,  at  the  age  of  eight,  he  was  sent  to  the  Edinburgh  High 
School  and  began  Latin,  and  he  had  also  a  tutor  at  home  who  taught 
him  writing,  arithmetic,  and  French,  nothing  but  Latinbeing  taught 
at  the  High  School.  The  tutor  was  a  Whig  and  a  Roundhead, 
little  Scott  a  Tory  and  Cavalier,  because,  as  he  said  himself,  he 
thought  it  the  more  gentlemanly  of  the  two.  He  was  not  much  of  a 
Latin  scholar,  and  knew  so  little  of  Greek  that  in  latter  life  he  had 
forgotten  even  the  letters  ;  but  was  even  at  the  High  School  a 
devourer  of  books,  especially  of  voyages,  travels,  Eastern  tales,  and 
novels.  In  1783,  at  the  early  age  of  twelve,  he  entered  the  Univer- 
sity of  Edinburgh,  studying  Greek  under  Dalzell,  and  moral  philos- 
ophy under  Dugald  Stewart,  but  he  does  not  appear  to  have  gone 
through  the  regular  curriculum  of  the  University,  or  to  have  gradu- 
ated. On  July  II,  1792,  he  was,  at  the  age  of  scarcely  twenty-one, 
called  to  the  Scottish  bar.  Before  this,  his  father  had  offered  to 
take  him  into  partnership  as  a  Writer  to  the  Signet,  but  Walter 
thought,  as  was  natural  to  one  of  his  disposition,  that  being  an  advo- 
cate was  the  more  gentlemanly  profession  of  the  two,  and  chose  it 
accordingly,  and  for  some  time  enjoyed  the  '  quips  and  cranks  '  of 
the  jolly  young  advocates  of  the  Parliament  House  and  cultivated 
literature,  rather  than  law,  much  to  the  disappointment  of  the 
worthy  old  Writer,  his  father  ;  in  short  he  was 

"  '  A  youth  condemned  his  father's  soul  to  cross, 
Who  penned  a  stanza  when  he  should  engross.' 

"About  this  time  (1792),  or  shortly  after,  he  fell  in  love  for  the  first 
time  with  Miss  Steuart  of  Fettercairn,  afterward  Lady  Forbes,  but 
his  wooing  was  unsuccessful,  and  he  was  so  deeply  smitten  and  so 
sadly  disappointed  that  his  ladylove  preferred  his  friend  to  himself, 
that  his  intimates  were  afraid  he  might  die  of  a  broken  heart  ;  but  a 
trip  to  the  Highlands  in  some  measure  restored  him  to  his  equa- 
nimity, and  apparently,  but  only  apparently,  he  had  felt,  like  his  own 
Lochinvar, 

"  '  Love  flows  like  the  Solvvay,  but  ebbs  like  its  tide.' 


4IO  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  In  reality  he  never  got  over  this  '  prime  passion,'  and  it  is  the 
key  to  some  of  his  deepest  utterances  of  feeling,  in  the  distresses 
of  his  later  years,  and  although,  as  he  says  himself  in  his  diary  of 
1825,  '  his  heart  was  handsomely  pieced,  the  crack  would  remain 
to  his  dying  day.'  In  1797  he  met  and  wooed  and  won  Miss  Char- 
lotte Carpenter,  a  young  lady  of  French  parentage,  whom  he  met 
at  the  watering-place  of  Gilsland,  in  Cumberland,  and  married  at 
Carlisle,  December  24,  1797. 

"  Scott's  poetical  translations  from  the  German,  and  his  '  Minstrelsy 
of  the  Scottish  Border,'  which  appeared  in  1802,  and  '  Sir  Tristrem  ' 
published  in  1804,  had  probably  rather  involved  him  in  expense  than 
brought  him  any  material  benefit,  while  his  hospitable  mode  of  life, 
even  in  his  early  married  days,  had  involved  him  in  debt,  his  only 
income  at  the  time  being  his  wife's  four  hundred  pounds  per  annum, 
and  three  hundred  pounds  which  he  enjoyed  after  December,  1799, 
as  sheriff  of  Selkirkshire. 

"  His  professional  gains  as  an  advocate  seem  to  have  been  next  to 
nothing.  He  must  therefore  have  looked  forward  with  great  anxiety 
to  the  result  of  the  publication  of  the  '  Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel,' 
which  took  place  in  January,  1805,  and  no  doubt  the  introduction  to 
that  first  of  his  three  great  poems  portrayed  with  accuracy,  mutatis 
mutandis,  his  own  feelings  before  that  noble  poem  was  given  to  the 
public.     He  felt  like  the  old  harper  of  this  immortal  work  : 

"  '  The  way  was  long,  the  wind  was  cold, 
The  minstrel  was  infirm  and  old — 
His  withered  locks  and  tresses  gray 
Seemed  to  have  known  a  better  day  ; 
The  harp,  his  sole  remaining  joy, 
Was  carried  by  an  orphan  boy  ; 
The  last  of  all  the  bards  was  he 
That  sang  of  Border  chivalry  ; 
For    well-a-day,  their  date  was  fled — 
His  tuneful  brethren  all  were  dead, 
And  he,  neglected  and  oppressed, 
Wished  to  be  with  them  and  at  rest. 
No  more,  on  prancing  palfrey  borne, 
He  carolled  gay  as  lark  at  morn  ; 
No  longer  courted  and  caressed. 
High  placed  in  hall,  a  welcomed  guest, 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  411 

He  sang  to  lords  and  ladies  gay 

The  unpremeditated  lay. 

Old  times  were  changed,  old  manners  gone, 

A  stranger  filled  the  Stewart's  throne  ; 

The  bigots  of  the  iron  time 

Had  called  his  harmless  art  a  crime  ; 

A  wandering  harper  scorned  and  poor, 

He  begged  his  bread  from  door  to  door, 

And  tuned,  to  please  a  peasant's  ear. 

The  harp  a  king  had  loved  to  hear.' 

"  The  'Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel  '  at  once  placed  Scott  among 
the  foremost  poets  of  the  age,  and  although  he  fancied  that  his 
verse  : 

"  '  Was  not  made  for  village  churls, 

But  for  high  dames  and  mighty  earls.' 

the  pecuniary  result  was  much  more  satisfactory  than  if  it  had  been 
restricted  to  that  category,  in  fact,  was  so  good  that  it  '  at  once  '  (in 
the  words  of  Lockhart)  '  decided  that  literature  should  form  the 
main  business  of  Scott's  life.' 

"His  next  great  literary  venture  was  '  Marmion,' published  in 
February,  1808,  a  noble  poem,  recalling  to  the  Scottish  mind  the 
saddest  epoch  of  our  history,  the  Battle  of  Flodden  Field.  Its  de- 
scriptions of  court  and  castles,  warriors  and  battlefields,  and  of 
Scottish  scenery,  stand  unrivalled.  What  can  be  finer  than  the 
word-picture  of  the  rising  sun  shining  on  '  Auld  Reekie,'  or  as  he 
delighted  to  call  it,  '  Mine  own  romantic  town,'  glorifying  its  very 
smoke,  as  Marmion,  escorted  by 

"  '  Sir  David  Lindsay,  of  the  Mount, 
Lord  Lyon  Kingat-Arms,' 

comes  in  view  of  Edinburgh,  as  you  approach  it  over  Blackford 
hill  by  the  old  coach  road  from  England  ? 

"  '  But  northward  far,  with  purer  blaze, 
On  Ochill's  mountains  fell  the  rays, 
And  as  each  heathy  top  they  kissed 
It  gleamed  a  purple  amethyst. 
Yonder  the  shores  of  Fife  you  saw, 
Here  Preston  Bay  and  Berwick  Law  ; 


412  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

And  broad  between  them  rolled 

The  gallant  Firth,  the  eye  might  note, 

W^hose  islands  on  its  bosom  float 

Like  emeralds  chased  in  gold. 

Fitz-Eustice  heart  felt  closely  pent, 

As  if  to  give  his  rapture  vent, 

The  spur  he  to  his  charger  lent, 

And  raised  his  bridle  hand, 

And,  making  demi-volt  in  air. 

Cried,  '  Where's  the  coward  would  not  dare 

To  fight  for  such  a  land  ?' 

"  In  iSio  appeared  the  '  Lady  of  the  Lake,'  the  greatest  of  Scott's 
three  great  poems,  by  which  liis  name  will  be  transmitted  farther 
down  the  ages  than  by  any  other  of  his  poetical  works.  It  was 
a  great  pecuniary  success,  no  less  than  twenty  thousand  copies  being 
sold  within  a  year  after  its  publication,  and  this  success  was  the 
main  cause  of  Scott's  purchase  of  Abbotsford,  which  again  was  the 
key  to  the  terrible  ruin  which  overtook  him  in  1826,  so  that,  if  mis- 
fortunes are  often  'blessings  in  disguise,' great  successes  may,  on 
the  other  hand,  be  the  first  step  to  our  greatest  misfortunes. 

"The  '  Lady  of  the  Lake  '  is  not  only  a  magnificent  poem,  but  it 
was  the  beginning  of  a  series  of  Scott's  works  which  have  done  more 
for  the  material  prosperity  of  Scotland  than  even  its  coal,  its  iron, 
and  its  hot  blast  furnaces,  by  attracting  the  attention  of  southern 
capitalists  to  its  superb  natural  scenery,  and  ultimately  drawing 
Queen  Victoria  and  her  court  every  summer  to  Balmoral,  in  the 
extreme  north  of  the  Highlands. 

"  I  have  not  the  least  doubt  that  Scott's  writings  have  enhanced 
the  value  of  Highland  property  many  millions  of  pounds  sterling. 
I  cannot  refrain  from  quoting  one  of  the  most  beautiful  passages  of 
that  most  beautiful  poem,  the  one  in  which  James  Fltz- James,  after 
the  death  of  his  'gallant  gray,'  wanders  to  the  banks  of  Loch 
Katrine,  and,  sounding  his  bugle  from  the  cliff  above  the  lake, 
Ellen  Douglas  pushes  out  her  shallop  in  expectation  of  seeing  her 
father  or  her  lover,  and  neither  being  in  sight,  and  expecting  a 
repetition  of  the  bugle  blast, 

"  '  With  locks  thrown  back,  and  lips  apart, 
Like  monument  of  Grecian  art. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  413 

In  listening  mood,  she  seemed  to  stand, 

The  guardian  naiad  of  the  strand  ; 

And  ne'er  did  Grecian  chisel  trace 

A  nymph,  a  naiad,  or  a  Grace, 

Of  finer  form  or  lovelier  face  ; 

What  tho'  the  sun  with  ardent  frown 

Had  sliglitly  tinged  her  cheek  with  brown. 

The  sportive  toil  which,  short  and  light, 

Had  dyed  her  glowing  hue  so  bright, 

Served  too,  in  hastier'swell,  to  show 

Short  glimpses  of  a  breast  of  snow  ; 

What  though  no  rule  of  courtly  grace. 

To  measured  mood  had  trained  her  pace  ; 

A  foot  more  light,  a  step  more  true  ; 

Ne'er  from  the  heath-flower  dashed  the  dew. 

E'en  the  slight  harebell  raised  its  head 

Elastic  from  her  airy  tread. 

What  though  upon  her  speech  there  hung 

The  accents  of  the  mountain  tongue,  • 

That  silver  voice,  so  soft,  so  dear. 

The  listener  held  his  voice  to  hear.' 

"  After  the  'Lady  of  the  Lake  '  Scott  published  '  Don  -Roderick  ' 
in  1811,  '  Rokeby  '  in  1812,  the  '  Lord  of  the  Isles'  in  1814,  and 
'  Harold  the  Dauntless  'in  1817,  which  is  the  last  of  his  poetical 
works,  and  none  of  these  efforts  ever  reached  the  popularity  of  the 
'  Lay,' '  Marmion,'  or  the  '  Lady  of  the  Lake.'  And  although  to  those 
who,  like  myself,  have  more  than  once  visited  the  Hebrides,  from 
Islay  to  Skye,  the  '  Lord  of  the  Isles  '  is  full  of  descriptive  passages 
of  the  greatest  beauty,  yet  the  objective  in  poetry,  as  civilization 
and  the  knowledge  of  mental  science  advanced,  was  bound  to  give 
way  to  the  subjective,  and  I  have  myself  a  dim  recollection  of  the 
more  subjective  poetry  of  Byron,  and  Wordsworth,  and  Coleridge 
becoming  more  attractive  and  admired  than  that  of  Scott,  and  it 
was  a  perception  of  this  fact,  I  believe,  that  induced  Scott  to  try 
his  hand  as  a  writer  of  novels.  I  have  a  distinct  recollection  of 
hearing  '  Waverley '  read  aloud  when  it  first  came  out,  in  the  fall  of 
1814.  I  was  then  a  little  fellow,  between  five  and  six  years  old,  and 
was  spending  the  summer  in  an  old-fashioned  house,  built  in  the 
reign  of  Charles  II.,  on  the  seashore  of  the  East  Neuk  of  Fife.  A 
party  of  ladies  and  gentlemen  were  sitting  in  a  room  looking  out  on 


414  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

a  splendid  view  of  the  Firth  of  Forth,  with  the  Bass  Rock  in  the 
distance,  and  beyond  it,  on  the  opposite  coast  : 

"  '  Tantallon  Castle's  dizzy  steep, 
Hung  o'er  the  margin  of  the  deep.' 

"  My  father  was  reading  aloud  a  new  novel  called  '  Waverley,' 
just  received  from  Edinburgh,  and  as  even  children  in  those  days 
had  the  deepest  interest  in  '  Prince  Charlie,'  I  suppose  my  attention 
and  interest  were  awakened  by  some  reference  to  him.  One  of  the 
ladies  in  the  house  at  the  time,  an  aged  relative  of  my  own,  recol- 
lected hearing  the  guns  firing  at  the  battle  of  Prestonpans,  in  Sep- 
tember, 1745,  so  that  I  have  seen  and  conversed  with  those  who 
remembered  that  memorable  period,  which,  as  you  may  recollect, 
forms  one  of  the  many  incidents  in  the  novel  of  '  Waverley.'  My 
recollection  of  '  Guy  Mannering,'  which  came  out  about  a  year  later, 
is  that  of  being.kept  awake,  and  half  frightened  out  of  my  wits,  by 
the  account  of  Dick  Hatteraick  and  the  smugglers,  as  it  was  read 
aloud  by  my  father  to  my  mother  in  the  room  in  which  I  had  been 
put  to  bed. 

"  Afterthis,  as  *  The  Antiquarj^'  '  Old  Mortality,'  '  Rob  Roy,'  etc., 
successively  made  their  appearance,  I  became  old  enough  to  read 
and  enjoy  them  by  myself,  and  to  look  forward  with  intense  interest, 
as  everyone  then  did,  for  the  next  novel  by  the  '  Author  of  Waver- 
ley.' In  those  days,  for  weeks  before  the  new  novel  made  its  ap- 
pearance, large  placards  appeared  in  the  Trongate  of  Glasgow  with 
this  quaint  announcement  :  '  In  the  press,  and  speedily  will  be 
published,  a  new  novel  by  the  "  Author  of  Waverley,"  '  etc. 

"  The  entire  conversation  of  the  day  seemed  to  be  about  the  last 
novel,  and  anticipations  of  what  the  next  one  was  to  be.  In  the 
social  circle  to  which  I  belonged,  I  never  recollect  of  hearing  the 
slightest  doubt  expressed  as  to  the  author  of  the  *  Waverley  '  novels. 
We  all  believed  he  was  Walter  Scott  and  no  other. 

"  '  Rob  Roy  '  was  of  course  an  especial  favorite  with  the  Glasgow 
people,  on  account  of  the  scene  of  so  many  interesting  incidents 
being  laid  in  the  Cathedral,  the  College  Green,  and  the  '  Saut 
Market '  ;  and  Bailie  Nicol  Jarvie  and  his  father  the  deacon  were 
felt  to  be  of  our  '  ain  kith  and  kin  ' ;  and  with  regard  to  Rob  Roy 
himself  I  had  a  more  than  ordinary  interest,  as  my  great  grandmother, 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  415 

a  Mrs.  Finlay  of  the  Moss  in  Strather.diick  (in  whose  house  of 
Moss,  George  Buchanan,  our  great  Scottish  historian,  was  born), 
concealed  her  silver  plate  in  a  churn  and  buried  it  in  the  garden,  in 
order  to  hide  it  from  Rob  and  his  reivers,  as  my  great  grandfather 
would  not  pay  him  blackmail,  from  conscientious  motives. 

"  The  time  would  fail  me  to  quote  even  in  the  briefest  manner 
from  the  sayings  of  the  innumerable  but  admirable  secondary  char- 
acters in  Scott's  novels,  such  as  the  Baron  of  Bradwardine,  Dominie 
Sampson,  Dandie  Dinmont,  Mistress  McCluchars,  the  owner  of  the 
Queensferry  stage,  Edie  Ochiltree,  Saunders  Mucklebacket,  Owen,  the 
bookkeeper  to  Osbaldistone  and  Treshatti  in  '  Rob  Roy,'  Cnddie 
Headrigg,  JVamba,  the  son  of  Witless,  Caleb  Balderstone,  and  John 
Girder,  the  churlish  cooper  in  the  '  Bride  of  Lammermoor,'  who  after 
feasting  the  Master  of  Ravensn'ood  axid  his  kinsman  the  Marquis  of 
Argyll,  when  Caleb  Balderstone  swore  that  Ravenswood  was  burnt 
down,  gave  strict  orders  to  his  wife  and  household,  not  to  mention 
'  marquis  or  masier,  deuk  or  drake,  but  to  redd  up  the  house,  set  by 
the  broken  meat,  and  if  t/iei-e  were  anything  utterly  uneatable,  let  it  be 
gi'en  to  the  puir  folk! 

"Scott  published,  beginning  with  'The  Lay'  and  ending  with 
'  Harold  the  Dauntless,'  no  less  than  eight  larger  poems,  and  several 
minor  ones.  He  publislied  in  all  twenty-seven  novels,  besides  the 
'  Life  of  Bonaparte,'  'Life  of  Swift,'  'Life  of  Dryden,'  numberless 
essays,  songs,  ballads,  etc.,  almost  all  of  which  I  have  read,  and  I  can 
recollect  no  word  or  expression  in  any  of  them  which  could  bring  a 
blush  into  the  cheek  of  virgin  purity.  What  a  change  in  this  respect 
had  taken  place  during  his  time,  from  what  existed  forty  to  eighty 
years  before  !  You  may  recollect  his  story  of  his  venerable  kins- 
woman, Mrs.  Keith  of  Ravelston,  who  asked  him  to  get  from  the 
Advocates'  Library  and  read  to  her  one  of  Mrs.  Aphra  Behn's  novels, 
which  in  her  youth  she  had  read  aloud  in  a  mi.xed  company  of  both 
sexes  without  any  feeling  of  impropriety,  yet  Scott  had  scarcely 
begun  to  read  it  before  she  exclaimed  :  '  Na,  na  !  tak  awa'yer  Aphra 
Behn  ;  I  canna  thole  her.' 

"Chesterfield,  writing  to  Mme.  du  Boccage  respecting  some 
French  plays,  says  in  1750,  'We  do  not  deserve  the  honor  you  do  us, 
of  translating  our  plays,  and  novels.  Your  stage  is  too  nice  and  too 
chaste  to  endure  most  of  our  performances,  which  carry  out  not  only 


4l6  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

freedom,  but  even  licentiousness,  beyond  the  bounds  of  decency  and 
probability.'  It  is  chiefly  owing  to  Sir  Walter  Scott  that  the  verdict 
of  187 1  would  reverse  the  dictum  of  six  score  years  before. 

"  In  1820  Scott  was  created  a  baronet,  and  became  Sir  Walter 
Scott  of  Abbotsford.  By  this  time  he  had  from^  his  sheriffship, 
clerkship,  and  his  wife's  income,  about  two  thousand  pounds  per 
annum,  besides  his  large  income  from  his  novels.  He  almost  kept 
o[)en  house  at  Abbotsford,  and  fulfilled  the  Scriptural  injunction  to 
the  letter,  '  to  exercise  hospitality  without  grudging.'  In  August, 
1822,  Scott  showed  his  power  over  popular  opinion  more  fully  and 
decidedly  than  ever  he  did  either  before  or  after.  In  1820  George 
IV.,  after  attempting  to  have  himself  divorced  from  Queen  Caroline, 
was  probably  the  most  unpopular  sovereign  who  ever  sat  on  the 
British  throne,  and  kept  his  head  and  his  throne.  The  people  of 
Scotland,  from  my  own  recollection,  jjarticularly  detested  him,  yet  I 
shall  never  forget  the  enthusiasm,  amounting  to  madness,  with  which 
he  was  welcomed  by  them  when  he  arrived  in  Edinburgh  on  August 
15,  1822.  Scott  had  turned  the  heads  of  the  soberest  Scotsmen. 
We  were  all  Jacobites,  Highlanders,  and  loyal  to  the  backbone  ;  for 
some  two  weeks — which  was  about  the  time  the  folly  lasted — Edin- 
burgh was  filled  with  the  followers  of  Argyll  and  Atholl,  Montrose 
and  Breadalbane,  McDonalds  and  Camerons,  and  Robertsons,  and 
all  the  clans  in  their  plaids,  kilts,  bonnets  and  dirks,  ''qtcorum  pars 
parva  fui!  Scott  obtained  for  *  Gentleman  George  '  this  grand 
national  ovation  and  welcome  which  no  other  man  could  have  done 
for  him,  and  yet  this  '  sceptered  thing,' 

"  '  Charles  to  Ms  people,  Henry  to  his  wife,' 

cold-shouldered  Scott,  if  he  did  not  absolutely  quarrel  with  him, 
even  before  he  left  Scotland,  because  '  His  Majesty  '  had  not  as  he 
thought  been  sufficiently  consulted  about  some  of  the  minor  details 
of  tlie  various  Edinburgh  pageants. 

"  It  would  be  quite  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  Scott's  novels  met 
with  the  universal  approval  of  his  own  countrymen.  Many  of  these 
were  displeased  and  shocked  at  his  sneers  at  the  Covenanters,  and  I 
very  well  recollect  that  after  reading  '  Old  Mortality  '  to  us,  my  own 
father  gave  as  an  antidote,  the  whole  of  Woodrow's  'Sufferings  of 
the  Kirk  of  Scotland,'  in  one  or  two  folio  volumes,  besides  an  occa- 


CONTINUATION   BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.   KANE.  417 

sional  dose  of  the  '  Scots  Worthies.'  Up  to  January,  1825,  Scott  had 
published  twenty-one  of  his  twenty-seven  novels,  and  in  the  latter 
part  of  that  year  was  engaged  upon  '  Woodstock,'  little  witting  the 
disaster  that  was  impending  over  him.  The  storm  did  not  actually 
burst  upon  Scott's  head  until  January  16,  1826,  when  through  the 
involvements  of  the  printing  house  of  James  Ballantyne  &  Co.,  of 
which  he  was  a  partner,  with  Constable  &  Co.  of  Edinburgh,  and 
Hurst  &  Robinson  of  London,  both  of  which  concerns  failed  in  that 
disastrous  crisis,  he  was  ruined,  and  became  personally  liable  for 
upwards  of  ;i^ioo,ooo  (^117,000). 

"  He  and  his  partners  might  have  gone  into  bankruptcy,  have  paid 
a  fair  dividend,  and  got  a  discharge  from  their  creditors,  but  Sir 
Walter  honorably  preferred  to  devote  all  his  future  time  and  talents 
to  the  noble  endeavor  to  pay  his  creditors  in  full,  if  they  would  con- 
sent to  give  him  an  opportunity  to  do  so,  which  they  willingly  did. 
Lockhart  says,  in  his  cynical,  sneering  way,  that  in  so  acting  Sir  Wal- 
ter acted  with  the  '  feelings  not  of  a  merchant,  but  of  a  gentleman.' 
I  thank  God  that  there  are  hundreds  of  merchants  on  both  sides  of 
the  Atlantic,  who  have  acted,  and  would  act,  in  precisely  the  same 
way  under  similar  circumstances. 

"  He  appears  also  to  have  settled  Abbotsford  upon  his  son  without 
consulting  his  partners  or  looking  into  his  affairs  to  ascertain  if, 
after  meeting  all  his  liabilities,  he  had  the  right  to  make  the  settle- 
ment. Perhaps  he  really  had,  at  any  rate  his  creditors  did  not 
disturb  that  settlement.  And  most  nobly  did  the  great  magician 
work  for  them,  so  that  on  December  17,  1830,  when  the  original  debt 
had  been  reduced  to  fifty-four  thousand  pounds,  his  creditors  unani- 
mously passed  this  resolution:  'That  Sir  Walter  Scott  be  requested 
to  accept  his  furniture,  plate,  linen,  paintings,  library,  and  curiosities 
of  every  description,  as  the  best  means  the  creditors  have  of  express- 
ing their  high  sense  of  his  most  honorable  conduct,  and  the  grateful 
acknowledgment  for  the  unparalleled  and  most  successful  exertions 
he  has  made,  and  continues  to  make  for  them.' 

"On  May  15,  1826,  on  the  top  of  all  Scott's  monetary  disasters, 
he  lost  the  wife  with  whom  he  had  lived  on  affectionate  terms  for 
twenty-nine  years,  and  although  she  was  not  his  first  love,  and  had 
her  foibles,  he  appears,  from  his  diary,  to  have  felt  the  loss  of  her 
society  deeply;  but  with  regard  to  this,  and  all  his  other  sorrows,  he 


41 8  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM     WOOD. 

acted  in  the  most  manly  manner,  and  '  set  a  stout  heart  to  a  stey 
brae,'  like  a  good  Scotsmen.  He  revisited  London  in  the  fall  of 
1826,  and  was  received  with  the  greatest  distinction  by  king,  nobles, 
and  people.  On  his  return  to  Scotland  he  continued  his  intense  ap- 
plication to  work,  and  on  February  15,  1830,  he  had  his  first  paralytic 
attack.  In  November,  1830,  he  had  another  slight  touch  of  apo- 
plexy. On  March  21,  1831,  he  spoke  at  a  public  meeting  at  Jed- 
burgh against  the  Reform  Bill,  and  was  hissed  and  hooted  at  for  his 
Tory  sentiments.  I  well  recollect  the  feeling  of  sorrow  which  we 
reformers  of  that  day  had,  that  Scott  was  not  on  our  side,  and  that 
the  noble  old  man  had  been  insulted  for  expressing  his  conscientious 
opinions,  however  erroneous  we  deemed  them.  On  April  18,  1831,  his 
friend  Allan  Maconochie,  Lord  Meadowbank,  who  was  serving  as 
judge  on  the  Jedburgh  Circuit,  came  to  stay,  as  was  his  custom,  at 
Abbotsford,  and  Scott,  desirous  of  welcoming  him,  in  his  old  jovial 
style,  drank  three  glasses  of  champagne,  and  had  a  third  stroke  of 
apoplectic  paralysis,  severer  than  either  of  the  preceding  two.  Still 
after  recovering  somewhat  he  went  on  bravely  with  his  work  of 
finishing  '  Count  Robert  of  Paris '  and  '  Castle  Dangerous,'  although 
himself  conscious  of  his  increasing  weakness,  both  of  body  and  mind. 
"  The  last  time  that  the  old  splendor  of  Abbotsford  was  renewed 
was  on  September  17,  1831,  when  Captain  James  Glencarin  Burns,  the 
son  of  Robert  Burns,  along  with  his  wife  and  John  McDiarmid  of 
the  Dumfries  Courier,  spent  a  day  under  his  roof,  and  having  his  son 
Major  Scott  to  assist  him.  Sir  Walter  did  the  honors  of  the  table 
gracefully.  He  lingered  on  until  September  17,  1832,  on  the  morn- 
ing of  which  day  he  sent  for  his  son-in-law,  Lockhart  ;  his  eye  was 
clear  and  calm,  but  he  felt  that  the  end  was  near  at  hand,  and  in  the 
spirit  of  a  little  child,  he  said  to  Lockhart  :  '  Be  a  good  man,  my 
dear  ;  God  bless  you  all,'  and  then  sank  into  a  tranquil  sleep.  He 
remained  almost  unconscious  until  September  21 — a  day  of  great 
beauty,  so  warm  that  every  window  in  the  house  was  opened,  and 
there,  surrounded  by  his  family,  with  the  rippling  sound  of  the 
Tweed  over  its  pebbles  distinctly  audible  as  they  knelt  around  his 
bed,  the  soul  of  the  Mighty  Minstrel  passed  from  '  Sunshine  to  the 
Sunless  land,'  and  fared  forth  upon 

"  '  that  inevitable  road 
Which  leads  us  to  our  last  abode.' 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  419 

"  It  is  to  the  memory  of  the  great  and  good  man,  whose  career 
from  the  cradle  to  the  grave  I  have  thus  roughly  and  imperfectly 
sketched,  that  we  are  about  to  erect  a  monument  in  this  noble  park  ; 
and  when  his  statue  shall  have  been  placed  on  that  pedestal  of  which 
we  to-day  lay  the  foundation,  it  shall  look  down  upon  many  a  lovely 
American  maiden,  as  light  of  foot  as  Ellen  Douglas^  upon  many  a 
sprightly  Die  Vernotj,  '  witching  the  world  with  graceful  horseman- 
ship,' and  it  may  be  also  on  the  man  of  maturer  years,  meditating 
about  the  uncertainties  of  human  life,  and  while  watching  the 
shadows  of  the  clouds,  as  they  chase  each  other  over  these  verdant 
fields,  feeling  in  his  inmost  heart  the  truth  of  Scott's  beautiful 
lines  : 

"  '  Like  April  morning  clouds  that  pass 
In  varying  shadow  o'er  the  grass, 
And  imitate  on  field  and  furrow 
Life's  chequered  scene  of  joy  and  sorrow.'  " 

The  conclusion  of  Mr.Wood's  address  was  made  amid  loud  cheering. 

In  February,  1873,  Commissioner  Wood  prepared  the  memorial 
to  the  Joint  Committee  on  Public  Education  of  the  Assembly  and 
Senate,  in  which  the  Board  of  Public  Education  remonstrates 
against  a  proposed  change  in  the  school  laws,  by  which  the  twelve 
commissioners  appointed  at  large  for  the  whole  city  by  the  mayor 
were  to  be  turned  out  of  ofifice,  and  a  substitution  made  of  twenty- 
one  commissioners,  appointed  for  seven  school  districts,  three  being 
from  each  district.     The  memorial  goes  on  to  say  : 

"  It  may  not  be  inappropriate  to  state  here  the  circumstances 
under  which  the  law  now  in  operation  was  passed.  Our  city  school 
system  has  gone  through  three  successive  changes  within  a  few  years 
past.  Prior  to  1864  the  Board  of  Education  was  composed  of 
forty-four  members,  two  being  elected  from  each  ward.  From  1864 
to  1869  the  board  was  composed  of  twenty-one  members,  elected 
from  districts  very  much  in  the  manner  in  which  the  present  bill 
proposes  to  deal  with  the  matter.  In  1869,  at  a  time  when  the 
Republican  party  had  a  majority  in  both  branches  of  the  Legisla- 
ture, the  present  law  was  passed.  It  was  deemed  then  to  be  an 
improvement  upon  what  had  existed  before  that  time.  It  was 
thought  that  twelve  commissioners,  non-partisan  in  their  character, 


420  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

and  unpaid  for  their  services,  would  raise  our  schools  to  that  high 
position  they  should  occupy.  While  the  representative  system  pre- 
vailed it  was  found  that  commissioners  looked  too  much  after  the 
schools  in  their  own  districts,  without  paying  much  regard  to  any 
other,  and  it  was  too  often  the  case  that  a  commissioner  sought  his 
return  to  office  by  pointing  to  the  many  privileges  which  he  had 
secured  for  the  section  of  the  city  which  he  represented. 

"  Since  the  present  board  has  been  in  power  no  charge  of  this 
kind  can  truthfully  be  made,  for,  appointed  as  the  members  of  it 
are  for  the  whole  city,  they  have  the  same  interest  in  the  schools  of 
each  district,  and  are  equally  concerned  in  all," 

The  question  of  interested  motives  on  the  part  of  school  com- 
missioners, touched  on  in  this  memorial,  explains  why  the  reform 
board  of  1869  adopted  Commissioner  Wood's  plan  of  dividing  the 
schools  into  twelve  groups,  to  be  visited  by  commissioners  appointed 
by  the  president.  No  commissioner  might  visit  the  schools  of  his 
own  group  more  than  once,  though  he  might  visit  others. 

It  also  shows  how  difficult  it  is  to  secure  disinterested  service  on 
the  part  of  a  citizen,  since,  if  he  is  not  paid  in  cash,  he  may  be  in 
political  influence.  Father  never  sought  political  influence  ;  he 
never  sought  place  for  himself  or  members  of  his  family.  He  had 
such  influence  as  a  man  known  to  be  thoroughly  honest  and  trust- 
worthy inevitably  gains  in  the  course  of  a  long  life  ;  but,  as  it  came 
to  him  unsought,  so  he  wielded  it  unconsciously.  He  worked  for  the 
city  of  his  adoption  because  it  ought  lo  be  done,  and  because  it  was 
his  nature  to  do  thoroughly  and  perfectly  all  that  he  undertook,  and 
to  make  others  do  the  same. 

One  of  the  men  whose  life  he  strongly  influenced  was  his  wife's 
nephew,  John  Grenville  Kane.  Coming  into  possession  unexpect- 
edly of  a  large  fortune  while  still  comparatively  young,  father 
thought  that  my  cousin  ran  great  danger  of  becoming  an  idle  man- 
about-town.  He  induced  him  to  go  to  work  with  him  in  the  Board 
of  Education,  and  made  a  useful  and  disinterested  public  servant  of 
him  until  his  death.  The  Kane  gold  medal  for  natural  science, 
given  annually  to  the  student  of  the  Normal  College  most  proficient 
in  that  study,  was  provided  for,  at  my  father's  suggestion,  by  a  gift  of 
one  thousand  dollars,  in  February,  1873,  from  John  Grenville  Kane. 


CONTINUATION   BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  42 1 

On  March  21,  1873,  the  act  against  which  the  board  had  memo- 
rialized passed  the  Legislature,  and,  in  conformity  with  it,  the  terms 
of  ofifice  of  the  commissioners  ended  at  the  expiration  of  fifteen 
days  from  the  passage  of  the  act. 

On  April  2,  at  the  last  regular  meeting  of  the  board,  Commis- 
sioner Wood,  having  obtained  unanimous  consent,  offered  for  adop- 
tion the  following  resolution  : 

"  Resolved,  That  the  eleven  female  principals  of  grammar  schools 
who  are  paid  less  than  the  maximum  salary  of  $2000  be  hereafter 
paid  that  sum  per  annum." 

Which  resolution  was  immediately  adopted,  no  doubt  to  the  great 
subsequent  joy  of  the  eleven  female  principals. 

The  retiring  board  then 

"  Resolved,  That  the  thanks  of  the  Board  of  Public  Instruction 
be,  and  they  are  hereby,  tendered  to  William  Wood,  Esq.,  for  the 
earnest,  able,  and  indefatigable  manner  in  which  he  has  discharged 
his  duties  as  a  member  of  this  board  and  chairman  of  the  Com- 
mittee on  Normal  College,  Evening  and  Colored  Schools." 

At  a  subsequent  special  session,  April  4,  Commissioner  Smyth 
moved  an  amendment  to  Commissioner  Wood's  resolution,  striking 
out  the  words  "  the  eleven  "  and  substituting  the  word  "  all,"  which 
was  unanimously  adopted,  and  the  board  adjourned  sine  die. 

My  father  being  legislated  out  of  ofifice,  received  the  following 
unexpected  and  gratifying  testimony,  beautifully  illuminated  and 
framed.  It  always  hung  in  his  library  among  his  special  treasures, 
coming  as  it  had  done  at  a  time  when  he  deemed  himself  "shelved." 

At  an  informal  meeting  of  the  Normal  College  of  the  City  of  New 
York  held  at  the  College  Hall,  April  4,  1873,  the  following  preamble 
and  resolutions  were  unanimously  adopted  : 

"  Whereas,  We,  the  students  of  the  Normal  College,  having  learned 
with  deep  regret  that  Mr.  William  Wood  has  retired  from  the  Board 
of  Public  Instruction,  and  consequently  from  the  committee  having 
special  charge  of  our  Institution  :  and, 

"  Whereas,  Mr.  William  Wood  has  always  manifested  a  true  inter- 
est in  our  welfare  and  comfort,  not  only  in  aiding  to  provide  for 
us  a  suitable  and  beautiful  edifice,  but  also  to  encourage  us  in  our 
intellectual  pursuits  :   and, 


422 


AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 


"  Whereas,  Mr.  Wood  has  most  earnestly  worked  to  elevate  woman 
by  endeavoring  to  provide  her  with  the  means  for  receiving  a 
collegiate  education  :  and, 

"  Whereas,  Mr.  Wood  has  ardently  tried  to  effect  the  advance- 
ment of  the  noble  work  of  Normal  Training,  therefore 

''''Resolved^  That  our  heartfelt  thanks  as  students  of  the  Normal  Col- 
lege and  representatives  of  the  sex  for  whose  elevation  he  has  most 
efficiently  labored  are  eminently  due,  and  are  hereby  tendered,  to 
Mr.  Wood,  for  his  unremitting  labors  in  our  behalf  during  the  past 
three  years. 

"  Resolved,  That  the  signature  of  each  member  of  the  committee 
who  drafted  these  resolutions  and  of  a  representative  of  each  class 
in  the  Normal  College  be  appended. 

"  Resolved,  That  these  resolutions  be  suitably  framed,  engrossed, 
and  presented  to  Mr.  Wood. 

Committee. 
"  Caroline  Jackson,  Ida  Davidson, 

Clarice  J.  Boole,  Rebecca  Dougherty, 

Josephine  Mackenzie,  Henrietta  Wright, 

Helen  A.  Stein,  Kate  Thompson. 

Sarah  J.  Duncan, 


Representatives. 


Clara  Collord, 
Isabella  Roy, 
Grace  Whitlock, 
Katie  S.  Hill, 
Fannie  Aitchison, 
Hattie  W.  Roberts, 
Bel  Shepard, 
Helina  a.  Johnstone, 
Maria  F.  Kiernan, 
LiLLiE  H.  Reynolds, 
Hester  A.  Roberts, 


Malvina  Colby, 
Elizabeth  C.  Grant, 
Louise  Balkan, 
Caroline  G.  Roberts, 
Hannah  De  Witt, 
Katie  N.  Davis, 
Gertrude  G.  Rafferty, 
Alletta  Patterson, 
Augusta  Knapp, 
Margaret  Coakley, 
Annie  F.  Brady." 


William  Wood's  name  does  not  appear  as  having  been  present  at 
the  opening  of  the  new  building  of  the  Normal  College  on  October 
29,  1873,  but  he  had  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that  it  was  engraved 
on  the  two  great  marble  tablets  near  the  main  entrance,  among  those 
of  his  fellow  commissioners  of  1870  and  1872. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  423 

DAILY  NORMAL  SCHOOL  FOR  FEMALES. 

Opened  February  14,  1870,  corner  of  Broadway  and  Fourth  Street. 

Commissioners  of  Public  Instruction. 

Richard  L.   Larremore,  President. 

Timothy  Brennan,  Samuel  A.   Lewis, 

William  E.   Duryea,  William  Wood, 

Isaac  Bell,  Nathaniel  Sands, 

Magnus  Gross,  Bernard  Smyth, 

Lorin  Ingersoll,  Thomas  Murphy. 

John  H.  Sherwood. 

Normal  College  Committee. 

Isaac  Bell,  Chairman. 
Bernard  Smyth,  William  Duryea, 

William  Wood,  Magnus  Gross. 

President  of  Normal  School. 
Thomas  Hunter, 

Clerk  of  the  Board  of  Education. 
William  Hitchman. 


NORMAL  COLLEGE  OF  THE  CITY  OF  NEW  YORK. 

Corner  stone  laid  March  19,  1872. 

Commissioners  of  Public  Instruction. 

Bernard  Smyth,  President. 

Timothy  Brennan,  Samuel  A.    Lewis, 

William  Wood,  Magnus  Gross, 

Lorin   Ingersoll,  William  E.   Duryea, 

Nathaniel  Sands,  Isaac  W.   England, 

Hooper  C.  Van  Vorst,  Nathaniel  Jarvis,  Jr., 

Enoch  L.  Fancher. 

N'ormal  College  Committee. 

William  Wood,  Chairman, 
William  E.    Duryea,  Magnus  Gross, 

Nathaniel  Jarvis,  Jr.,  Enoch  L.   Fancher. 

President  of  Normal  College. 
Thomas  Hunter. 

Clerk  of  Board  of  Public  Instruction, 
Lawrence  D.  Kiernan. 


Mason's  work,   Cummin^s   H.   Tucker  &  Sons. 
Dorchester  stone,   Sinclair  &  Milne. 
Carpenter's  work,   William  J.   O'Connor. 
Architect,   David  I.   Stagg. 


424  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Father's  widowed  sister,  Eliza  G.  Pell,  died  August  16,  1873,  at 
Salzburg  in  the  Austrian  Tyrol,  of  cholera.  She  was  on  a  tour  with 
two  of  the  daughters  of  his  sister  Anna,  Mrs.  Cross,  and  arrived  at  , 

Salzburg,  unaware  that  cholera  was  raging  there.     She  was  stricken  I 

with  it,  and  carried  at  once  from  the  hotel  to  the  hospital.  Her 
nieces  were  not  allowed  to  be  there  with  her  over  night,  and  heard 
of  her  death  on  their  arrival  at  the  gates  in  the  morning.  As  her 
trustee,  my  father  found  his  hands  full  in  securing  to  her  only 
daughter  her  share  of  her  father's  estate,  as  well  as  her  mother's. 

In  March  or  April  of  the  same  year  the  home  at  4  West  Eighteenth 
Street  was  gladdened  by  the  accession  of  the  family  of  my  father's 
youngest  daughter  Helen.  Mrs.  Watts  and  her  children  were,  if  pos- 
sible, more  dear  to  my  father  than  any  of  his  descendants.  She  was 
of  a  more  lively  disposition  than  the  rest  of  us,  and  like  Evangelme, 

"  '  Sunshine  of  Saint  Eulalie'  was  she  called  ;  for  that  was  the  sunshine 
Which,  as  the  farmers  believed,  would  load  their  orchards  with  apples  ; 
She,  too,  would  bring  to  her  husband's  house  delii^ht  and  abundance, 
Filling  it  full  of  love  and  the  ruddy  faces  of  children." 

From  that  time  till  his  death  this  dear  daughter  and  her  sweet 
children  lived  with  him,  and  it  was  his  pride  and  delight  to  see  one 
and  another  of  her  fair  girls  graduate  with  honor  from  the  Normal 
College.  Several  of  the  children  were  born  in  his  house,  and  the 
little  things  fondled  him  from  infancy  as  we  had  never  dared  to  do. 
It  was  a  pretty  sight  to  see  that  large  household  gathered  in  the 
library  at  morning  prayers.  I  recall  in  particular  one  little  grand- 
daughter, Ethel,  who  had  chosen  from  infancy  to  devote  her  special 
attention  to  her  grandfather  at  this  hour. 

Living  to  his  great  age,  it  was  inevitable  that  the  phrases  of  his 
extemporaneous  prayers  should  gradually  formulate  themselves. 
On  one  of  my  visits  to  my  old  home,  when  Ethel  was  hardly  more 
than  four  years  old,  she  one  morning  escorted  me  to  a  seat,  and 
when  we  all  knelt,  she  nestled  close  to  me  and  led  my  devotions,  in 
a  barely  audible  voice,  but  always  a  word  ahead  of  her  grand- 
father in  his  prayer,  and  finishing  in  the  greatest  hurry  with  a  whole 
half  sentence  to  spare,  "  And  while  we  pray  for  others,  suffer  not 
ourselves  to  be  castaways."  The  innocent  little  tongue  could  hardly 
form  the  long  words.  As  she  grew  older  she  took  her  stand  by  his 
side,  and  painstakingly  found  the   places  for  him   in  his  Bible,  her 


CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.   ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  425 

long  brown  locks  sweeping  his  shoulder,  and  touching  the  silvery 
abundance  of  his  flowing  beard.* 

It  was  in  July,  1874,  that  my  father  contributed  to  the  Atlantic 
Monthly  an  interesting  article  on  "  Scottish  Banking,"  and  on  the 
1 6th  of  the  same  month  his  old  uncle  Alexander    Dennistoun  died. 

On  January  2,  1875,  my  eldest  half-brother,  Dennistoun,  mar- 
ried Edith,  daughter  of  Howard  C.  Phillips  and  granddaughter  of 
William  W.  Phillips,  D.  D.,  pastor  for  forty  years  of  the  First 
Presbyterian  Church,  New  York.  The  ceremony  was  performed  at 
the  First  Church  by  Rev.  John  Hall  of  the  Fifth  Avenue  Presby- 
terian Church. 

On  April  28,  1875,  Mayor  Wickham  appointed  William  Wood  as  a 
Commissioner  of  Common  Schools,  on  the  death  James  W.  Farr,  and 
to  serve  for  the  remainder  of  his  term,  that  is,  till  December  31,  1876. 

My  father  wrote  to  me  every  Thursday  from  the  time  of  my  mar- 
riage in  1853  until  his  death,  and  scarcely  a  letter  was  without  some 
reference  to  his  school  work.  He  took  so  lively  an  interest  in  it 
that  it  could  not  be  said  of  him,  as  of  his  predecessor,  Mr.  Farr, 
that  "  in  the  deliberations  of  the  board  he  never  indulged  in  any 
asperities  of  language,  always  conceiving  his  duty  quickly  and  per- 
forming it  promptly,  and  without  mistrust  of  his  fellow-members." 
I  am  under  the  impression  that  he  frequently  differed  very  emphati- 
cally with   some  of  his  fellow-members,  particularly  with  the  then 

*  One  of  my  sisters  noted  down  the  prayer  I  refer  to  from  memory  : 

"We  thank  Thee,  O  Heavenly  Father,  for  Thy  mercies,  which  Thou  hast 
shown  us  during  the  past  night.  We  beseech  Thee  to  be  with  us  through  all  the 
days  of  our  appointed  time  on  earth.  Guide  and  direct  us  with  Thy  Holy  Spirit, 
Strengthen  us,  we  beseech  Thee,  in  mind  and  body,  and  fit  us  for  the  various 
duties  which  lie  before  us,  and  may  all  we  do  be  begun,  continued,  and  ended  in 
Thee.  May  we  be  in  Thy  fear  all  the  day  long.  Wash  us  from  all  our  sins  in  the 
precious  blood  of  Christ.  Clothe  us  in  the  robes  of  His  righteousness.  Let  Thy 
blessing  rest  upon  us  as  a  family.  Unite  our  hearts  to  fear  Thy  holy  name. 
Watch  over  those  dear  ones  who  are  absent  from  us,  and  bless  them  as  they  sever- 
ally require.  Comfort  those  who  mourn  ;  may  they  find  in  Thee  a  very  present 
help  in  every  trouble  and  in  every  trial,  and,  while  we  pray  for  others,  suffer  not 
ourselves  to  be  castaways. 

"Wilt  Thou  hear  our  prayers  and  answer  them  in  peace,  for  the  sake  of  Him  who 
ever  sitteth  at  Thy  right  hand  to  make  intercession  for  us.     Amen." 

In  later  years  he  added  :  "And  who  has  taught  to  pray,  '  Our  Father,  who  art 
in  Heaven,'  "  etc. 


426  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

president  of  the  board,  his  old  friend,  and  relative  by  marriage, 
William  H.  Neilson.  However  that  may  be,  he  found  his  time  well 
filled  with  the  work  of  the  several  committees  in  which  he  took  Mr. 
Farr's  place  :  committees  on  Supplies,  Course  of  Study  and  School 
Books,  Normal  Schools,  Nomination  of  Trustees,  Salaries  and 
Economy.  In  addition  President  Neilson  appointed  him  to  the 
vacancy  on  the  special  committee  to  confer  with  the  trustees  of 
the  Roman  Catholic  parochial  schools.  This  committee  had  been 
appointed  in  the  previous  month  in  answer  to  the  following  applica- 
tion, and  I  fancy  that  in  this  case  tlie  post  of  honor  was  the  post  of 
danger  to  any  politician,  who  must  run  the  risk  of  offending  either 
his  Protestant  or  Roman  Catholic  fellow-citizens. 

To  the  Honorable  the  Board  of  Educatio7i : 

"  The  undersigned  representatives  and  trustees  of  the  Catholic 
parochial  schools  in  this  city,  respectfully  request  your  honorable 
board  to  appoint  a  committee  of  its  members  to  meet  a  similar 
committee  from  this  body,  to  consider  on  what  terms  the  said  paro- 
chial schools  may  be  admitted  to  tlie  benefits  of  the  common 
school  system,  subject  to  its  laws  as  regards  the  course  of  instruc- 
tion, the  methods  of  discipline,  and  the  general  management  in  such 
manner  as  may  be  agreed  upon. 

"  The  undersigned,  moreover,  represent  that  they  have  approached 
this  subject  from  the  desire  of  having  extended  to  the  thirty  thou- 
sand children  who  now  attend  the  parochial  schools,  and  who  are 
taught  gratuitously,  the  benefits  of  the  common  or  free  school  system. 

"The  undersigned  would  state  that  they  represent  more  than  fifty 
schools,  most  of  which  have  large  and  commodious  buildings,  erected 
for  school  purposes,  provided  with  almost  everything  necessary  for 
free  schools,  and  capable  of  affording  sufficient  space  for  from  three 
hundred  to  one  thousand  children  each. 

"  The  undersigned  believe  that  upon  the  right  intelligence  of  the 
people  depend,  in  a  great  measure,  their  safety  and  happiness,  and, 
indeed,  the  prosperity  of  the  country  ;  and  that  claiming  to  have 
these  objects  in  view,  they  desire  to  find  a  common  ground  for 
action  that  will  be  mutually  agreeable  and  beneficial. 

"  The  undersigned  refer  to  the  fact  that  a  union,  somewhat  similar 
to  that  here  proposed,  exists  in  many  parts  of  the  State,  and  in  some 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  427 

Other   States;  and   that  the  results  have   been   so  satisfactory   that 
Protestants  and  Catholics  alike  approve  and  support  it. 

"As  the  undersigned,  and  those  whom  they  represent,  have  paid, 
and  still  pay,  their  full  share  of  the  taxes  that  go  to  the  support  of 
the  common  schools,  they  hope  your  honorable  body  will  favorably 
consider  their  request,  and  take  such  action  in  respect  thereto  as 
may  ultimately  lead  to  greater  harmony  in  a  work  of  such  vast 
importance  as  that  of  popular  education. 
"New  York,  March  15,  1875. 

"William  Quinn,  Vicar  General. 

Jeremiah  Devlin,  62  West  39th  Street. 

J.  W.  McKinlev,  315  East  50th  Street, 

James  Lynch,  148  West  22d  Street. 

F.  H.  Churchill,  126  East  22d  Street. 

Peter  Dolan,  ?o2  West  24th  Street. 

Timothy  O'Donoghue,  80  University  Place. 

Henry  L.  Hoguet,  148  West  28th  Street. 

James  Olv^ell,  43  West  i6th  Street. 

Lewis  J.  White,  3  Howard  Street. 

Jeremiah  J.  Campion,  20  East  loth  Street. 

James  R.  Floyd,  14  Van  Ness  Place. 

E.  J.  O'Reilly,  Pastor  of  St.  Mary's. 

James  Moore,  270  East  Broadway. 

Arthur  J.  Donnelly,  Pastor,  383  Ninth  Avenue. 

Jeremiah  Quinlan,  117  East  69th  Street. 

D.  A.  Merrick,  Pastor  of  St.  Fr.  Xavier's  Church. 
"  In  behalf  of  the  Trustees  of  Catholic  Free 
Schools  of  the  City  of  New  York." 

Commissioner  Wetmore  moved  that  said  communication  be 
referred  to  a  special  committee  of  seven,  and  that  the  president  be 
one  of  the  members  of  said  committee. 

The  president  put  the  question  whether  the  board  would  agree 
with  the  motion  of  Commissioner  Wetmore,  and  it  was  decided  in 
the  affirmative. 

The  president  announced  the  said  committee  as  follows  :  Com- 
missioners Wetmore,  Townsend,  Farr,  Kelly,  Vermilye,  Baker,  and 
the  president. 


428  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    ^YOOD. 

I  do  not  find  that  the  Committee  on  Conference  made  any 
report  in  1875,  but  the  Journal  of  the  Board  of  Education  mentions 
various  memorials  and  protests  against  the  use  of  the  public  school 
moneys  for  sectarian  schools — such  as  "  Memorial  from  a  Jewish 
Citizen,"  "  Resolutions  of  the  Presbytery  of  New  York  of  the  Ninth 
Assembly  District,"  "  Protest  from  Citizens,"  "  Methodist  Preachers' 
Meeting  Resolutions,"  "  Protest  of  the  Methodist  Conference," 
"  Resolutions  of  the  American  and  Foreign  Christian  Union." 

On  February  2, 1876,  Commissioner  Goulding  offered  the  following: 

"Whereas,  Public  attention  has  been  called  to  a  certain  text-book 
published  by  authority  of  the  Board  of  Education  of  the  City 
and  County  of  New  York,  known  as  'Literary  Selections  for  the 
Normal  College,'  which  contains  a  passage  at  page  459  commencing 
*  Corrupt  as  the  Church  of  Rome  was,'  and, 

"  Whereas,  The  same  may  be  deemed  offensive  to  the  religious 
sentiments  of  a  large  section  of  our  community,  and  prejudicial  to 
the  efficiency  of  the  common  school  system,  by  impairing  public 
confidence  in  the  broad  and  liberal  principles  upon  which  that  system 
was  established,  and  is  now  conducted  ;  therefore, 

^'Resolved,  That  the  text-book  known  as  '  Literary  Selections  for 
the  Normal  College  of  the  City  of  New  York,'  and  now  in  use  in 
that  institution,  be,  and  it  hereby  is  expunged  from  the  list  of  text- 
books, and  its  further  use  in  any  college  or  school  under  the  jurisdic- 
tion of  the  Board  of  Education  of  the  City  and  County  of  New 
York  is  hereby  prohibited.  " 

This  text-book  was  prepared  by  President  Hunter,  following  sug- 
gestions of  my  father's.  The  passage  objected  to  was  quoted  from 
an  extract  from  Macaulay's  History  of  England,  and  the  passage 
runs  :  ''  The  sympathies  of  the  Protestant,  it  is  true,  will  naturally 
be  on  the  side  of  the  Albigenses  and  the  Lollards.  Yet  an  enlight- 
ened and  temperate  Protestant  will  perhaps  be  disposed  to  doubt 
whether  the  success,  either  of  the  Albigensians  or  the  Lollards, 
would,  on  the  whole,  have  promoted  the  happiness  and  virtue  of 
mankind.  Corrupt  as  the  Church  of  Rome  was,  there  is  reason  to 
believe  that  if  that  Church  had  been  overthrown  in  the  twelfth  or 
even  the  fourteenth  century,  the  vacant  space  would  have  been 
occupied  by  some  system  more  corrupt  still." 


CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.    KANE.  429 

It  strikes  me  that  neither  the  accusers  nor  the  defenders  of  the 
"  Selections  "  had  read  the  passage  in  full,  else  the  Protestants  of 
the  nineteenth  century  might  have  been  as  fully  justified  in  object- 
ing to  the  censure  on  those  who  were  Protestants  in  the  twelfth  or 
fourteenth,  as  Commissioner  Goulding  was  in  his  defense  of  the 
maligned  Church  of  Rome.  Party  feeling,  however,  was  gratified, 
and  the  "  Literary  Selections,"  from  Shakspere,  Milton,  Wordsworth, 
Tennyson,  and  other  equally  controversial  writers,  were  banished 
from  the  list  of  supplies.  Yet  the  book  was  a  good  one,  and  the 
reasons  for  its  publication  alleged  in  President  Hunter's  preface 
were  excellent  ones.  A  valid  objection  to  it  might  have  been  made 
of  a  totally  different  kind.  Commissioner  Wood  stood  convicted  in 
it  of  nepotism  for  the  only  time  in  his  life  ;  for  among  the  host  of 
great  names  in  the  index  of  the  work,  there  appears  at  the  end  the 
humble  one  of  Elizabeth  Dennistoun  Cross,  a  niece  of  my  fatlier's, 
who  died  young,  leaving  a  slender  volume  of  verse,  from  which  he 
culled  two  favorite  poems  for  the  book.  My  dear  father  !  He 
wished  so  much  to  associate  her  name  with  his  work  in  the  Normal 
College,  and  to  have  her  "  Aurora",  and  "  Wild  Roses  "  perpetuated 
in  the  memories  of  other  girls  of  her  age  !  He  was  so  truthful  and 
sincere  himself  that  he  was  easily  gratified  by  a  kindly  word  of 
praise  of  the  effusions  of  those  he  loved,  and  never  could  be  brought 
to  see  why  his  own  children  should  choose  to  remain  "  mute,  in- 
glorious  Miltons  "  where   their  cousins   could  excel. 

It  was  in  this  year  1875  that  my  father,  succeeding  Mr.  Farr  in 
the  Committee  on  By-Laws,  offered  a  resolution,  part  of  which  reads: 

"And  Whereas,  on  April  i,  1874,  the  same  committee  made  a 
long  report  to  this  board,  respecting  the  prevalence  of  the  same 
offenses  against  good  morals  in  the  Eighth  Ward,  and  of  the  insolent 
demeanor  of  a  certain  police  captain,  Alexander  S.  Williams,  who 
was  sent  by  his  superiors  to  furnish  information  to  said  committee  on 
the  matters  referred  to,  etc.,  etc. 

"  Whereas,  A  Select  Committee  of  the  Assembly  of  this  State  is 
now  sitting  in  this  city,  for  the  purpose  of  inquiring  into  the  causes  of 
the  steady  and  rapid  increase  of  crime,  and  the  inadequacy  of  the 
proper  authorities  to  cause  its  speedy  suppression  :  therefore, 

"  Resolved^    That   the  members  of   the  Committee  on   By-Laws, 


430  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

Elections,  and  Qualifications  be,  and  are  hereby  appointed  a  special 
committee  to  wait  upon  the  Select  Committee  of  the  Assembly  now 
inquiring  into  the  causes  of  the  steady  and  rapid  increase  of  crime  in 
the  city  of  New  York,  etc.,  etc.,  and  to  lay  before  said  Select  Com- 
mittee of  the  Assembly  the-  reports  of  the  Committee  on  By-Laws, 
etc.,  of  January  21  and  April  i,  1874,  and  to  take  such  further 
action  in  the  matter  as  to  the  said  Special  Committee  of  this  Board 
may  seem  proper  and  judicious." 

The  president  put  the  question  whether  the  board  would  adopt 
said  resolution,  and  it  was  decided  in  the  affirmative. 

Twenty  years  after  the  time  that  the  committee  reported  his  inso- 
lence to  the  board.  Captain  A.  S.  Williams  appeared  before  the 
Lexow  Investigating  Committee  of  the  Senate,  who  were  examining 
into  the  corruption  existing  in  the  Police  Department  of  the  city  of 
New  York.     On  December  27,  1894,  Mr.  Goff  inquired  of  him  : 

"  Why  did  you  refuse  to  give  the  name  of  the  owner  of  that  house 
to  Mr.  Wood,  the  President  of  the  Board  of  Education,  who  con- 
ducted the  investigation  of  those  charges,  when  you  admitted 
knowing  the  name  ?  " 

Answer.     "  Because  the  investigation  was  not  an  honest  one." 

"  But  Mr.  Wood  was  one  of  the  most  highly  esteemed  men  in  this 
city.     Why  did  you  refuse  to  give  the  name  ?  " 

Answer.  "  Because  of  the  character  of  the  committee,  and  because 
it  was  wanted  for  publication." 

On  January  12,  1876,  William  Wood  was  elected  president  of  the 
Board  of  Education,  receiving  fourteen  of  the  twenty  votes  cast. 

The  president  addressed  the  board  as  follows  : 

*'  Gentlemen  of  the  Board  of  Education  : 

"  A  wise  man  has  said  that  we  ought  to  '  expect  the  unexpected,' 
but  I  am  very  sure  that  if  anyone  had  said  to  me  at  this  time  last 
year  that  I  should  occupy  the  position  in  which  you  have  to-day  so 
kindly  placed  me,  it  would  have  seemed  utterly  incredible  ;  yet, 
nevertheless,  here  I  am.  And  I  hope  I  may  be  pardoned  for  a  little 
excusable  egotism  if  I  should  state  to  you  my  experience  with  regard 
to  my  somewhat  extended  connection  with  the  Board  of  Education. 

"  The  first  time  that  I  had  the  honor  of  standing  here  it  was  as 
president  pro  tempore  in   May,  1869,  when  a  new  board  was  inaugu-^ 


CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  43 1 

rated,  and  I  suppose  that  the  words  I  then  spoke  somewhat  horrified 
the  friends  of  a  higher  education,  by  my  declaring  that  the  func- 
tion of  the  Slate  was  solely  to  receive  children  and  give  to  them 
an  education  which  should  make  them  thoroughly  acquainted  with 
reading,  writing,  and  arithmetic  ;  but  they  forgot  that  from  that 
proposition  flow  a  great  many  corollaries,  which,  by  the  thorough 
teaching  of  these  preliminary  studies,  are  brought  into  practical 
effect.  There  was  the  mistake  of  those  who  thought  I  was  opposed 
to  the  higher  education,  and  I  think  that  my  whole  course  in  this 
board  showed  that,  far  from  being  adverse  to  higher  education,  I 
have  always  advocated  it  for  teachers  to  aid  in  bringing  about  the 
very  results  which  I  say  it  is  the  duty  of  the  State  to  obtain  before 
all  others. 

"  When  I  entered  this  board  I  was  one  of  a  somewhat  hopeless 
minority,  but  I  was  the  first  of  that  minority  who  became  chairman 
of  one  of  the  standing  committees.  Further,  on  February  6,  1873, 
my  colleagues  asked  me  to  go  up  to  Albany,  and,  with  the  then 
Commissioner,  but  now  Alderman,  Lewis,  to  do  what  I  could  to 
defeat  the  very  bill  under  which  this  board  now  lives  and  moves 
and  has  its  being  ;  and  on  that  day  it  was  the  most  unexpected  thing 
possible  that  I  should  ever  again  have  a  seat  in  this  board,  and  cer- 
tainly beyond  all  expectation  that  I  should  be  elected  its  president. 
On  April  4,  1873,  we,  who  were  sometimes  nicknamed  the  '  Twelve- 
Apostles,'  were  summarily  turned  out  of  our  places,  and  had  we 
been  in  reality  the  twelve  apostles,  we  would  not  have  fared  one 
whit  better,  as  it  was  entirely  an  affair  of  party.  Then  I  said,  in 
order  that  my  successors  may  not  think  that  I  intend  to  poach  upon 
their  manor  or  do  anything  to  render  their  position  with  regard  to 
the  public  schools  irksome,  I  shall  not  enter  a  common  school  for  a 
year,  and  ,1  kept  my  vow.  I  was  offered  a  commissionership  in 
November,  1874,  in  this  board,  but  for  reasons  outside  of  it  I  could 
not  accept  the  offer  ;  but  when,  by  a  sad  visitation  of  Providence,  a 
way  was  opened  up  for  me  last  spring  to  resume  the  position  which 
I  had  vacated  in  1873,  as  Chairman  of  the  Committee  on  the  Nor- 
mal College,  I  returned  to  the  board.  But  I  did  so  with  some  hesi- 
tancy and  with  some  misgivings,  as  of  all  the  gentlemen  composing 
the  board  I  knew  only  four,  and  I  felt  that  I  had  been  misrepre- 
sented,  and  to  some  extent   maligned,  and   therefore    I    hesitated 


432  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD, 

about  even  then  accepting  a  commissionership.  But  I  was  too 
much  attached  to  our  system  of  common  schools,  and  especially  to  the 
Normal  College  portion  of  it,  to  resist  the  temptation  ;  and  so  I 
returned  to  the  board,  and  it  gives  me  the  very  greatest  pleasure  to 
say  that  from  the  moment  I  entered  it  I  have  received  nothing  but 
courtesy  and  kindness,  and  now  this  crowning  act  of  your  confi- 
dence has  placed  me  here.  Our  late  president,  however,  very 
frankly  and  honestly  stated  to  me  that  he  had  done  what  he  could 
to  prevent  my  obtaining  a  seat  in  the  board.  He  said  he  had  no 
personal  objection  tome,  although  he  had  known  me  for  more  than 
thirty  years,  but  his  policy  was  opposed  to  mine.  And  so,  gentle- 
men, I  do  not  look  upon  this  position  as  any  personal  triumph,  but 
as  the  triumph  of  the  great  principle  of  progress,  the  triumph  of 
advancement,  in  opposition  to  that  of  stagnation,  and  possibly  even 
of  retrogression. 

"  But,  gentlemen,  a  truce  to  personal  matters.  With  regard  to 
the  common  schools  of  New  York  ;  there  is  no  one  to  whom  I  yield 
in  my  admiration  of  the  beauty  of  the  theory  of  the  common  school 
system  ;  we  see  the  children  entering,  first,  the  primary  schools, 
thence  promoted  to  the  grammar  schools,  from  which  the  boys 
enter  the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York,  and  the  girls  the 
Normal  College. 

"  Nothing  in  theory  can  possibly  be  finer  or  better.  But  when 
we  come  to  look  at  the  practical  working,  then,  as  there  are  spots 
in  the  sun  (and  astronomers  say  there  are  pretty  big  ones),  we  find 
that  at  the  entrance  of  our  educational  system,  where  perfection  is 
most  needed,  there  is  a  very  large  blot,  and  it  is  just  over  the  pri- 
mary departments  and  schools.  The  children  in  the  primary 
schools  constitute  two-thirds  of  the  whole  number  that  attend  the 
common  schools — one-third  being  in  the  grammar  schools,  and  two- 
thirds  in  the  primary.  The  following  figures  are  interesting  :  The 
average  number  of  children  in  the  primary  departments  and  schools 
for  the  year  ending  December  31,  1875,  was  61,779,  against  36,572 
in  the  grammar  schools.  The  total  number  of  children,  December 
3f,  1875,  98,351,  against,  at  the  same  date  in  1874,  95,897,  showing 
an  increase  during  the  year  1875  of  2454. 

"  Now,  the  first  fault  in  the  primary  school  system  is  that  the 
children  are  allowed  to  enter  far  too  young  ;  the   law   says  that  they 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  433 

may  enter  nifoiir.  I  think  children  should  not  be  allowed  to  enter 
any  school  until  they  are  six  years  old.  After  visiting  all  the  pri- 
mary schools  and  departments,  I  am  sure  that  the  Legislature  could 
never  have  intended  that  the  public  schools  should  be  sww^Xy  public 
nurseries,  as  they  are  ;  and  the  sooner  that  the  law  is  changed  and 
the  admission  of  children  under  six  years  of  age  prohibited,  the 
better  for  the  children  and  the  better  for  the  schools. 

"  Then  again,  while  there  are  two-thirds  of  all  the  children  under 
instruction  in  the  primary  schools,  the  salaries  of  the  teachers  are 
lower  than  in  the  grammar  schools,  and  in  proportion  to  the 
scholars,  the  teachers  are  fewer.  And  what  is  all  this  but  class  legis- 
lation of  the  very  worst  sort,  and  that,  too,  against  the  poorest  class 
of  the  people  in  the  city  of  New  York  ?  Those  who  attend  the 
primary  schools  and  never  go  beyond  them  (and  one-half  of  those 
who  do  enter  never  get  into  the  grammar  schools)  have  no  oppor- 
tunity of  receiving  instruction  in  after  life  ;  while  those  who  go  to 
the  grammar  schools  are  generally  the  children  of  parents  who  can 
afford  to  give  them  an  education  outside  of  the  common  schools  if 
their  education  is  not  completed  in  them  ;  and  hence  I  say  that  the 
first  duty  devolving  upon  this  board  is  to  overhaul  the  condition  of 
the  primary  schools.  They  have  not  only  fewer  teachers  in  propor- 
tion to  scholars,  but  the  primary  departments  are  in  the  lower  parts 
of  the  buildings  ;  they  are  not  so  nicely  fitted  up  as  the  grammar 
schools,  and  the  ventilation  and  light  are  not  as  good.  Now,  all 
these  things  ought  to  be  remedied,  and  the  primary  schools  and 
departments  properly  ventilated,  properly  lighted,  and  supplied  with 
a  competent  corps  of  teachers  ;  not  teachers  who,  after  they  have 
acquired  the  art  of  teaching  in  the  primary  schools,  are  immediately 
taken  away  from  them  and  promoted  to  the  grammar  schools,  where 
the  salaries  are  higher,  and,  I  think,  the  work  easier  and  more  inter- 
esting. I  hope  this  important  matter  will  engage  your  attention  ; 
it  is  the  most  important  matter  connected  with  the  entire  school  system. 

"  With  regard  to  the  grammar  schools,  I  must  say  that  they  have 
my  admiration  ;  in  both  the  boys'  and  girls'  departments  there  is  a 
great  deal  that  gives  pleasure  to  everyone  who  is  interested  in  the 
great  cause  of  common  school  instruction.  Perhaps,  though,  even 
there,  it  would  be  well  if  the  studies  were  simplified,  and  some  of 
them  stricken  out    altogether.     It    would    be   well   if  the   study  of 


434  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

grammar,  and  the  analyzing  of  sentences  in  a  poll-parrot  fashion, 
which  nine-tenths  of  the  children  do  not  understand,  and  which 
therefore  does  them  no  good  whatever,  were  so  stricken  out,  except 
for  the  highest  grade,  and  the  time  so  saved  were  devoted  to  culti- 
vating a  taste  for  literature  ;  then,  I  think,  a  very  great  improve- 
ment would  take  place  in  the  education  afforded  by  the  grammar 
schools. 

"  Besides,  gentlemen,  you  will  also  have  to  deal  with  the  question 
of  the  foreign  languages  in  the  grammar  schools.  There  is  now  on 
the  table  of  the  board  a  resolution  that  the  teaching  of  French  and 
German  should  be  restricted  to  the  three  upper  grades  in  the  gram- 
mar school  ;  that  resolution  waits  for  a  two-third  majority  to  carry 
it  into  effect,  and  to  this  the  attention  of  the  commissioners  should 
be  directed  without  delay.  x\s  a  mere  intellectual  exercise,  I  have 
no  objection  to  the  teaching  of  these  branches,  although  it  be  of 
little  practical  use.  But  if  it  should  be  found  that  even  the  limiting 
of  these  languages  to  the  three  upper  grades  interferes  with  the 
proper  study  of  English,  it  seems  to  me  that  they  should  be 
excluded  altogether  from  the  common  schools.  I  am  of  opinion 
that  our  scholars  should  be  thoroughly  acquainted  with  their  own 
noble  English  language,  and  by  making  them  thoroughly  acquainted 
with  it,  we  shall  also  make  them  the  very  best  kind  of  American 
citizens. 

"  The  next  subject  for  consideration  is  the  Normal  College ;  in 
it  I  have  always  taken  the  deepest  interest.  I  am  confident  that 
it  is  now  doing  a  vast  and  noble  service  in  educating  an  accom- 
plished corps  of  teachers  under  the  able  management  of  Pres- 
ident Hunter.  To  that  college  this  year  there  has  been  added 
a  chair  of  French,  and  I  have  no  doubt  that  in  future  that  fine 
language  will  be  more  studied  than  it  has  hitherto  been.  Every- 
thing is  going  on  in  the  Normal  College  as  well  as  heart  could 
desire  ;  but  I  think  it  would  be  only  fair  to  the  young  women  there, 
who  are  being  educated  for  teachers,  to  arrange  that  they  should 
have  the  same  advantage  with  regard  to  the  length  of  the  curric- 
ulum as  their  brothers  have  in  the  College  of  the  City  of  New- 
York,  and  that  a  full  year  ought  to  be  added  to  that  curriculum,  for 
it  is  not  fair  to  expect  that  young  women  of  seventeen,  going  out 
as  teachers  into  the  schools   after  only   three  years  training  in  the 


CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.    KANE.  435 

Normal  College,  should  be  able  to  compete  on  equal  terms  with 
young  men  of  twenty-one,  who  have  had  five  years'  study  in  the 
College  of  the  City  of  New  York.  I  hope  this  important  matter 
will  have  the  attention  of  the  board  at  its  earliest  convenience. 

"  I  should  have  said,  in  speaking  of  the  grammar  schools,  that,  if 
it  be  desired  to  simplify  the  course  of  study  in  them,  there  will  be 
found  on  pages  524  to  527  of  the  Journal  of  November  22, 
1871,  a  system  of  studies  which  was  prepared  and  digested  by  prac- 
tical educators  of  the  very  highest  character  ;  and  the  board  could 
not  do  better,  in  my  opinion,  than  follow  out  the  course  which  is 
there  laid  down. 

"  As  to  the  Normal  College  graduates,  I  am  told  and  believe  that 
there  are  seventy  teachers  teaching  in  our  common  schools  who 
entered  the  Normal  College,  but  never  graduated.  This  is  a  most 
unjust  thing  to  the  graduates  of  the  Normal  College  who  have  gone 
through  their  course,  and  have  passed  a  most  severe  ordeal  of  ex- 
amination, and  the  sooner  some  by-law  is  passed  by  this  board  which 
shall  prevent  a  recurrence  of  such  a  state  of  matters,  the  better  for 
the  college,  and,  what  is  even  of  more  consequence,  the  better  for 
the  schools  of  the  city. 

"  And,  gentlemen,  there  is  another  matter  in  regard  to  the  Normal 
College.  Up  to  last  year  there  was  always  a  difficulty  in  having  the 
license  to  teach  coincident  with  the  diploma  of  the  college.  Thanks 
chiefly  to  the  exertions  of  ex-Commissioner  Townsend,  last  June, 
an  agreement  was  entered  into  between  the  President  of  the  Normal 
College  and  the  City  Superintendent,  by  which  the  Normal  College 
examinations  were  made  to  suffice  for  both  purposes,  and  by  which 
agreement  the  college  graduates  received  their  licenses  to  teach  at 
the  same  time  that  they  obtained  their  diplomas.  I  ask  that  the 
agreement  I  have  referred  to  be  taken  from  the  files  of  the  Commit- 
tee on  Normal  College,  and  be  shaped  into  a  by-law  of  this  board. 
But  further  than  this,  it  appears  to  me  that  the  diploma  of  the 
College  of  the  City  of  New  York  or  the  diploma  of  the  Nor- 
mal College  should  give  to  an  individual  holding  either,  without  any 
further  examination,  the  power  of  teaching  in  all  the  common 
schools  of  this  city,  and  the  sooner  you  come  to  such  a  conclusion, 
and  obtain  the  requisite  legislation  to  effect  the  desired  result,  the 
better  will  it  be  for  the  schools  and  for  the  colleges. 


436  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  With  regard  to  the  subject  of  music,  the  board  that  went  out  of 
existence  on  the  31st  of  December  last  has  left  you  a  legacy  which 
you  will  find  somewhat  troublesome.  No  one  can  be  appointed  by 
you  under  the  actually  existing  by-law  as  a  special  teacher  of  music 
excepting  a  director  and  eight  assistant  directors,  and  yet  it  is  not 
likely  that  any  of  these  can  be  appointed.  It  will  be  well,  at  an 
early  date,  therefore,  to  see  if  some  other  plan  cannot  be  devised, 
and  the  existing  by-law  changed.  Though  we  spend  twenty-one 
thousand  dollars  per  annum  on  the  teaching  of  music,  I  fear  that  our 
musical  results  are  very  far  behind  those  of  the  city  of  Boston,  and  I 
think  steps  ought  to  be  taken  to  put  us  on  a  par  with  that  city  in 
this  respect. 

"  With  regard  to  the  evening  schools,  I  am  happy  to  say  that,  as  far 
as  I  have  learned,  they  are  this  year  somewhat  better  conducted 
than  they  have  hitherto  been.  As  to  the  Evening  High  School,  I 
can  speak  from  personal  observation,  as  I  have  been  there  repeatedly 
during  the  last  three  months.  Every  genuine  lover  of  popular  edu- 
cation must  have  his  heart  gratified  by  seeing  the  numerous  attend- 
ance of  young  men  from  fifteen  and  up  to  middle  age — men  of  forty 
or  fifty — attending  that  school  in  all  sorts  of  weather,  and  receiving 
the  supplementary  education  which  the  denied  or  neglected  oppor- 
tunities of  their  younger  days  may  have  rendered  necessary.  And  I 
think  it  will  be  well  for  the  appropriate  committee  to  direct  its  at- 
tention to  the  Evening  High  School,  so  that  there  shall  be  no  inter- 
ference with  regard  to  examining  its  scholars  ;  for  all  these  scholars 
are  grown  up  and  independent.  They  go  there  voluntarily;  the 
school  has  all  its  professors  and  teachers  selected  directly  by  the 
Evening  School  Committee,  and  they  may  be  changed  every  year  if 
needful;  and  there  is  no  necessity  for  other  supervision  than  that 
which  is  provided  for  by  the  internal  arrangements  of  the  school. 
It  has  flourished  entirely  upon  its  own  merits,  and  I  hope  that  some 
by-law  will  be  passed  by  the  board  to  carry  into  effect  this  suggestion, 
and  so  sustain  in  its  pristine  condition  this  admirable  institution. 

"  Now,  gentlemen,  with  regard  to  our  own  high  and  sacred  trust — 
for  I  do  say  from  the  bottom  of  my  heart  that  it  is  a  most  sacred 
trust — we  have  a  tendency,  I  am  afraid  (troubled,  as  we  are,  with 
the  multitude  of  details  which  must  necessarily  crave  our  constant 
attention),  to  lose  sight  of  those  great  principles  which  underlie  the 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.    KANE.  437 

whole  system  of  common  school  education,  and  in  attending  to  the 
details,  we  forget  to  look  to  the  thorough  education,  intellectually 
and  morally,  of  the  immense  number  of  children  (nearly  one  hun- 
dred thousand)  of  this  city  who  are  almost  wholly  dependent  upon 
this  board  to  see  that  they  receive  a  suitable  education.  In  attend- 
ing to  the  '  mint,  anise,  and  cummin  '  of  supplies  and  buildings, 
don't  let  us  forget  'the  weightier  matters  of  the  law,  judgment,  mercy, 
and  truth,'  moral  and  intellectual  training. 

"  Gentlemen,  I  have  to  apologize  for  detaining  you  so  long,  but  you 
can  at  least  console  yourselves  with  this  reflection,  that  by  putting 
me  in  this  position  you  have  effectually  closed  my  mouth  for  the 
rest  of  this  year." 

Commissioner  Hazeltine  offered  the  following  resolution: 

"  Resolved,  That  the  address  of  the  president  be  entered  in  full  in 
the  minutes,  and  that  the  several  topics  of  the  address  be  referred 
to  the  appropriate  committees." 

The  president  put  the  question  whether  the  board  would  adopt 
said  resolution,  and  it  was  decided  in  the  affirmative. 

At  this  meeting  a  communication  was  received  from  Mayor  Wick- 
ham  announcing  the  appointment  of  "Stephen  A.  Walker  in  place  of 
Wm.  H.  Neilson,  resigned." 

President  Wood's  reference  to  Mr.  Neilson's  opposition  to  his 
election  shows  that  the  resignation  was  in  consequence  of  his  ex- 
pected success.  The  appointment  of  Stephen  A.  Walker  gave  my 
father  a  firm  friend  and  comrade  in  their  future  work  together. 

On  January  18,  1876,  Trustee  William  Wood  was  elected  chair- 
man of  the  Board  of  Trustees  of  the  College  of  the  City  of  New 
York,  and  made  the  following  address  : 

"  Gentlemen  :  I  beg  very  gratefully  and  from  my  heart  to  thank 
you  for  the  honor  you  have  conferred  upon  me  to-day.  I  will  en- 
deavor to  perform  the  duties  of  chairman  of  the  Board  of  Trustees 
to  the  best  of  my  ability  ;  and  I  hope  we  shall  all  endeavor  to  pro- 
mote the  interests  of  the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York. 

"Gentlemen,  before  saying  anything  with  regard  to  the  present  or 
the  future  condition  of  the  college,  I  shall  assume  the  privilege  of 
taking  a  retrospective  glance  at  its  history  from  the  time  of  my  first 


438  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

connection  with  the  Board  of  Trustees  in  1869.  You  are  aware 
that  on  May  12,  in  that  year,  the  old  board  was  succeeded  by  an 
appointed  one  of  twelve  members,  the  previous  number  having  been 
twenty-one.  In  this  new  board,  consisting  of  twelve  members, 
there  were  a  good  many  of  the  trustees  who,  from  one  cause  or  an- 
other, were  by  no  means  friendly  to  the  College  of  the  City  of  New 
York.  Some  of  them  wished  it  to  be  transformed  into  a  mere 
technological  institute,  and  others  were  even  in  favor  of  abolishing 
it  altogether. 

"  You  will  all  remember,  too,  that  when  we  came  to  look  into  the 
affairs  of  the  college,  everyone  was  struck  with  this  fact — that  it 
seemed  to  be  in  a  moribund,  or,  at  least,  in  a  comatose  condition. 
The  first  thing  to  be  done  by  us  was  to  revivify  it,  if  it  were  possible 
to  do  it,  at  once.  When  the  matter  of  the  election  of  a  president 
to  the  college  came  up  there  were  a  great  many  persons  talked  of 
for  that  responsible  office — one  member  wanted  one  man  and  an- 
other another.  There  seemed,  however,  to  be  no  unanimity  with 
regard  either  to  their  opinions  or  their  choice  in  this  respect.  And 
at  the  time  I  was  put  in  mind  of  an  experiment  which  you  have  all 
doubtless  seen  in  physics — that  is,  where  there  is  a  crystal  cylinder 
filled  with  water  and  put  under  an  exhausted  receiver  with  a  freez- 
ing mixture  around  it ;  the  temperature  can  be  lowered  several 
degrees  below  the  freezing  point,  and  yet  the  water  in  the  cylinder 
remains  fluid,  but  give  it  the  least  shake  and  it  crystallizes  in  an  in- 
stant. Now,  the  condition  of  the  Board  of  Trustees  seemed  to  me 
very  much  like  this  water  in  the  cylinder  ;  their  views  as  to  the 
presidency  had  no  cohesion  ;  nobody  knew  who  was  going  to  be 
proposed  for  president.  It  was  at  this  time  that  somebody  sug- 
gested the  name  of  General  Alexander  Stewart  Webb,  and  in  a 
moment  every  vote  was  crystallized  upon  him,  and  I  was  never 
present  at  an  election  where  the  hearts  and  voices  were  so  unani- 
mous in  the  choice  ;  and  I  am  sure,  gentlemen,  that  the  result  has 
shown  the  wisdom  of  our  election,  when  we  contrast  the  living  col- 
lege of  to-day  with  the  moribund  college  of  1869. 

"In  the  organization  of  the  board  of  1869  I  naturally  expected, 
from  being,  with  the  exception  of  Judge  Larremore,  the  only 
university-trained  man  in  the  board,  that  I  should  be  one  of  the 
Executive  Committee  ;  but,  somewhat  to  my  surprise,  I  was  left  out. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  439 

This  was  on  account,  as  I  afterward  heard,  of  my  being  considered 
a  kind  of  educational  Ishmaelite,  wlio  was  opposed  to  all  the  higher 
branches  of  education,  and  who  only  advocated  the  teaching  of  the 
three 'R's.'  Now,  it  is  true  that  I  consider  that  reading,  writing, 
and  arithmetic  should  be  taught  thoroughly,  and  that  upon  that 
foundation  the  legislature  may  command  us  to  build,  of  '  gold, 
silver,  precious  stones,  wood,  hay,  or  stubble,'  but  the  foundation 
must  first  be  securely  and  thoroughly  laid.  As  a  trustee  of  this 
board,  and  as  Commissioner  of  Education,  I  am  bound  by  my  oath 
to  follow  out  the  laws  of  the  State,  and  am  bound  to  do  whatever 
shall  seem  best  to  promote  the  educational  system  of  this  city, 
including  the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York. 

"  Soon  after  this  affair  the  question  came  up  as  to  having  a  pro-" 
fessor  of  Latin  and  a  professor  of  Greek  ;  and  those  trustees  who 
were  in  favor  of  turning  the  college  into  a  mere  technological  insti- 
tute were  doing  their  best  to  have  no  professor  either  of  Latin  or 
Greek  appointed.  I  may  say,  I  hope  without  presumption,  that 
Judge  Larremore  and  myself  turned  the  tide  of  battle  in  favor  of 
classical  learning,  and  that,  had  it  not  been  for  him  and  myself, 
the  probability  is  that  neither  a  Latin  chair  nor  a  Greek  chair 
would  have  existed  at  this  day  in  the  College  of  the  City  of  New 
York. 

"  Well,  gentlemen,  when  the  trustees  began  to  see  that  I  was  not 
so  wild  a  man  as  they  had  fancied,  /  iiuis  appointed  upon  the  Execu- 
tive Committee ;  but  this  I  was  not  inclined  to  accept,  for  there 
seemed  to  me  to  be  an  insuperable  obstacle  in  the  way.  It  was  that 
the  executive  committee  of  the  board  existing  previously  to  1869 
consisted  of  seven  members,  being  one-third  of  the  entire  board, 
which  was  all  very  well  ;  but  when  the  board  was  reduced  to  twelve 
members  the  committee  of  seven  was  unparliamentary,  inasmuch  as 
the  creature  was  greater  than  the  creator.  I  could  not,  therefore, 
conscientiously  serve  upon  an  executive  committee  so  constituted, 
and  the  result  was  that,  after  '  pegging  away  '  at  the  matter  for  about 
a  year  or  more,  I  did  get  the  executive  committee  reduced  to  five. 
I  did  not,  however,  then  take  a  place  on  the  committee,  because  my 
time  and  attention  were  largely  given  to  assisting  in  the  organization 
of  the  Normal  College.  And  this,  gentlemen,  accounts  for  my  not 
having  any  part  in  the  direct  management  of  this  institution  hereto- 


440  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

fore,  though  indirectly,  I  think  you  will  acknowledge,  I  have  had  a 
good  deal  to  do  with  it. 

"  I  was  deliglited  to  see  in  the  report  of  the  faculty,  of  Decem- 
ber, 1875,  to  the  trustees,  that  besides  having  the  Greek  and  Latin 
chairs,  certain  improvements  of  method  in  the  teaching  of  those 
two  noble  languages  had  been  made  in  the  last  year  and  a  half,  and 
their  result  has  been  most  satisfactory.  The  report  says :  '  The 
beneficial  influence  of  the  new  arrangement  on  the  Latin  and  Greek 
departments  has  been  strikingly  apparent  from  the  beginning.  It  is 
now  the  official  report  of  the  professor  of  English  literature,  and  of 
the  professors  of  Latin  and  Greek,  that  the  senior,  junior,  and 
sophomore  classes  seem  animated  by  a  new  spirit.  The  interest  in 
the  Latin  and  Greek  studies  has  been  doubled.  On  the  one  hand, 
reciting  more  frequently,  they  do  not  lose  sight  of  the  subject  mat- 
ter, as  they  did  formerly,  when  several  days  elapsed  between  their 
recitations.  On  the  other  hand,  being  much  more  occupied  with  the 
languages,  a  zealous  earnestness  has  been  kindled  among  them,  and, 
in  consequence,  they  find  their  labor  comparatively  easier.  They 
are  acquiring  a  deeper  insight  into  manners  and  customs,  the  history, 
geography,  philosophy,  and  literature  of  the  ancients.'  Ah  !  that  is 
the  keynote  of  the  whole  matter  ;  that  is  what  has  given  the  in- 
creased  interest   to   the  study   of  the   classical   languages. 

Then,  gentlemen,  the  next  important  step  in  the  history  of  the 
institution  during  these  years  was  the  organization,  in  a  separate 
edifice,  of  the  introductory  department  of  the  college  ;  and  here  I  took 
a  very  deep  and  active  interest,  both  in  the  erection  of  a  new  building 
for  said  department  and  in  the  appointment  of  my  much-esteemed 
friend.  Professor  Scott,  to  whom  was  assigned  the  charge  of  that 
department.  There  was  at  that  time  a  sort  of  sub-current  of  oppo- 
sition running  against  the  appointment  ;  but  I  knew  very  well  in  the 
end  that  would  be  turned  into  approbation  ;  and  I  don't  know  even 
being  elected  president  of  the  Board  of  Education  has  given  me 
more  satisfaction  than  reading  the  report,  dated  December  i,  1875, 
which  says  :  *  In  the  month  of  September,  1871,  the  introductory 
class  was  removed  to  the  new  building  on  Twenty-second  Street. 
The  transfer  of  this  large  number  of  young  students  from  the  main 
building  has  been  productive  of  the  best  results.  It  has  permitted 
that  change  of  the  internal  arrangements  of  the  college  which  secures 


CONTINUATION   BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.   KANE.  44I 

so  much  more  comfort  and  quiet  during  the  hours  of  recitation. 
The  discipHne  in  the  four  college  classes  is  excellent,  and  yet  they 
are  allowed  much  more  liberty  than  in  former  times.  It  was  not 
possible  to  attain  this  result  when  the  five  classes  mingled  in  the 
hallways.  There  is,  however,  such  perfect  accord  in  the  tone  of 
executive  management  in  the  two  buildings,  that  the  several  fresh- 
man classes  have  been  received  from  the  hands  of  the  professor  in 
charge  of  the  introductory  classes  fully  prepared  to  conform  to  the 
different  regulations  in  a  manner  most  gratifying  to  the  faculty. 
The  result  puts  at  rest  all  doubts  which  existed  four  years  ago  in 
regard  to  the  expediency  of  the  measure.' 

"  The  next  thing  I  took  an  interest  in  was  the  management  of  the 
library  of  the  college  ;  along  with  Dr.  Holland,  Mr.  Brennan  and 
I  were  appointed  a  sub-committee  to  inquire  into  the  management  of 
the  library,  and  the  report  which  was  signed  by  the  committee  was 
drawn  up  by  myself.  So  you  may  imagine  that  I  am  delighted  to 
find  in  this  very  faculty  report,  to  which  I  have  already  referred, 
that  I  have  not,  in  that  matter,  '  cast  my  bread  upon  the  waters' — 
and  some  people  thought  it  was  pretty  bitter  bread — without '  finding 
it  after  many  days.' 

The  faculty  report  says  :  'The  library  is  still  improving,  and  its 
new  catalogue  will  be  published  next  year.  Its  arrangement  and  the  ex- 
cellent government  of  the  librarian,  in  all  matters  of  purchase  and  class- 
ification, meet  with  the  cordial  approval  and  sympathy  of  this  faculty.' 

"  Now,  gentlemen,  I  shall  further  refer  only  to  the  present  condi- 
tion of  tlie  college. 

"  I  see,  by  the  latest  faculty  report,  that  the  students  in  the 
college,  including  the  Introductory  Department,  number  1006  ;  in 
the  Introductory  Department,  604  ;  Freshmen,  195  ;  Sophomore, 
95  ;  Junior,  65  ;  and  the  Senior,  47.  To  classify  them  in  a  some- 
what different  way,  there  are  604  in  the  introductory  class,  and  402 
in  the  four  higher  classes  ;  three-fifths  in  the  introductory  class,  and 
two-fifths  in  the  higher  classes.  All  this  is  very  gratifying  till  you 
go  up  to  the  senior  or  graduating  class,  where  you  find  only  47 
students  ;  that  is  to  say,  that  the  graduating  class  has  not  in  it  above 
five  per  cent,  of  those  who  enter  the  college,  and  not  quite  twelve 
per  cent,  of  the  whole  number  who  enter  the  higher  classes  from  the 
Introductory  Department. 


442  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  I  know  very  well  that  in  regard  to  all  the  institutions  of  higher 
learning  a  very  great  difference  exists  between  the  number  of  those 
who  enter  the  lower  classes  and  those  who  come  out  of  the  higher- 
But  I  do  feel  that  in  this  case  so  great  a  discrepancy  ought  not  to 
exist.  There  ought  to  be  a  very  much  larger  number  coming  up 
to  the  senior  class  ;  and  when  the  students  from  the  Introductory 
Department  enter  the  freshmen  class,  I  do  think  that  every  effort 
should  be  made  by  us  to  see  that  they  continue  in  the  college  ; 
and  I  believe  that  before  long,  instead  of  graduating  47,  the  college 
should  graduate  at  least  100.  I  believe  this  can  be  done,  and  I  will 
tell  you  why  I  believe  it  can  be  done.  Some  fifty  years  ago  the 
University  of  St.  Andrews,  which  is  situated  in  a  delightful  locality, 
with  pure  air  and  grand  scenery,  near  the  most  beautiful  ruins  of 
ecclesiastical  architecture  in  Great  Britain,  and  one  of  the  best 
known  places  of  learning, — for  it  is  the  oldest  university  in  Scotland, 
being  founded  in  1450, — had  for  some  reason  dwindled  down  to  a 
very  small  number  of  students.  There  seemed  no  particular  reason 
for  this  ;  the  professors  were  of  the  same  high  order  they  had 
always  been  ;  they  had  very  good  salaries,  considering  the  rates  of 
living  in  that  neighborhood  ;  their  social  position  was  a  desirable 
one  for  literary  men  to  hold.  But  the  number  of  students  kept 
dwindling  all  the  time  ;  and  to  show  you  how  the  number  of 
students  in  an  old  university  like  that  may  be  greatly  increased,  let 
me  tell  you  what  happened  under  my  own  eyes. 

"  In  1825,  I  left  my  own  native  University  of  Glasgow,  of  which 
I  was  an  alumnus,  to  attend  upon  Dr.  Chalmers'  lectures  on  moral 
philosophy  and  political  economy  at  St.  Andrews.  He  came  there 
when  the  college  was  in  the  condition  described.  The  moment  he 
began  his  lectures  the  whole  city  was  filled  with  students  from  the 
other  Scottish  universities,  and  also  from  Oxford  and  Cambridge. 
'  Oh,  well,'  you  may  say,  '  that  remarkable  man  drew  crowds  to  his 
own  classroom  ;  '  but  his  was  not  the  only  class  which  was  benefited, 
every  department  of  the  university  was  correspondingly  affected  ; 
and,  although  the  old  Tory  professors  had  no  idea  of  putting  them- 
selves out  of  the  way  to  draw  students  to  the  university,  yet  when 
they  saw  another  man  becoming  so  popular,  it  excited  them  to 
greater  exertion,  and  they  were  not  a  little  jealous  of  his  fame.  I 
recollect  very  well  that  they  would  not  allow  Dr.  Chalmers  to  preach 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  443 

in  the  university  chapel,  and  the  result  was  that  when  he  did  preach, 
some  ten  or  twelve  miles  away,  there  was  a  stampede  of  all  the  stu- 
dents to  go  and  hear  him.  That  is  what  a  little  change  did  for  St. 
Andrews  ;  and  down  to  the  present  day  that  university  has  main- 
tained the  position  it  then  achieved. 

"  So,  I  say  the  fault  is  not  entirely  with  the  students  or  with  the 
parents  of  the  students.  I  believe  that  if  sufficient  inducements  were 
held  out  to  join  the  higher  classes  of  the  College  of  the  City  of  New 
York,  we  should  not  see  the  attendance  in  either  the  junior  or  the 
senior  classes  dwindling  into  the  very  miserable  number  which  the 
register  now  shows. 

"  And,  gentlemen,  this  is  a  thing  which  the  taxpayers  of  the  city  of 
New  York  look  at  with  anything  but  pleasant  eyes.  On  my  way 
down  here  to-day  I  had  a  conversation  with  a  very  large  taxpayer 
upon  this  very  subject.  I  think  that  if  these  classes  were  up  to  the 
standard  of  numbers  which  it  might  be  reasonably  expected  they 
should  attain,  none  of  the  taxpayers  would  think  the  money  misspent  ; 
but  they  do  look  for  some  better  results  from  the  money  so  liberally 
contributed  for  the  support  of  our  institution. 

"  With  regard  to  the  college  I  wish  to  say  this  :  I  have,  since  my 
return  to  the  board,  repeatedly  asked  for  a  manual,  and  have  not 
been  able  to  obtain  one  ;  they  seem  to  have  disappeared  entirely. 
But  there  is  something  more  than  a  manual  I  should  like  to  have, 
and  it  is  what  I  think  we  are  entitled  to  have — that  is,  a  printed 
copy  of  all  the  minutes  and  the  results  of  the  action,  not  only  of  the 
Board  of  Trustees,  but  of  the  executive  committee,  as  far  back  as 
they  can  be  got.  I  believe  the  printed  records  do  not  go  further 
back  than  1870  ;  and  I  think  that  each  member  should  not  only  have 
a  copy  of  these  records  in  his  possession,  but  also  that  the  manu- 
script records  should  be  printed,  and  a  copy  given  to  each  trustee. 
It  seems  to  me  these  would  only  make  a  single  thick  octavo  volume  : 
but  if  they  should  make  one,  two,  or  three  volumes,  we  ought  to 
have  them.  We  have  a  right  to  know  what  has  been  done  here,  and 
we  can  only  get  at  it  at  present  by  hunting  and  fishing  in  out-of-lhe 
way  places  ;  and,  after  all,  we  do  not  have  the  means  of  arriving  at 
the  right  conclusions. 

"  I  hope  the  executive  committee  will  see  that  we  have  a  proper 
supply  of  such  records,  containing  all  the  transactions  in   regard  to 


444  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York  up  to  December  31,  1875. 
Perhaps  two  hundred  copies  of  the  volumes  had  better  be  printed 
and  distributed  among  the  friends  of  the  college,  and  each  year  after- 
ward we  ought  to  have  an  annual  report,  exactly  like  the  minutes  of 
the  Board  of  Education. 

"  Gentlemen,  again  thanking  you  for  your  courtesy  and  kindness  in 
placing  me  here,  I  await  your  pleasure." 

Trustee  Beardslee  moved  that  the  address  of  the  chairman  be 
entered  in  full  in  the  minutes,  and  that  the  suggestions  made  be 
referred  to  the  executive  committee. 

The  chairman  put  the  question  whether  the  board  would  agree 
with  said  motion,  and  it  was  decided  in  the  affirmative. 

An  inspection  of  the  minutes  of  the  Board  of  Education  gives  but 
a  small  idea  of  the  work  done  by  its  members.  Its  reports  from 
committees,  and  resolutions  passed,  sway  the  lives  of  thousands  of 
persons  and  explain  the  expenditure  of  millions  of  dollars,  but  there 
is  nothing  to  show  the  eagerness  of  debate,  the  anxious  thought,  the 
careful  examination  into  the  truth  of  a  complaint  against  a  teacher 
and  the  weighing  of  one  person's  statement  against  another,  which 
a  committeeman  has  had  to  make.  Consider  what  it  means  for  a 
busy  man  to  set  aside  from  his  own  interests  the  mere  time  for  the 
board  meetings  twice  a  month.  My  father  hardly  ever  failed  to 
attend,  and  as  the  distance  from  his  house  to  the  hall  was  consider 
able,  he  could  not  return  in  time  for  his  own  dinner  hour,  and  con- 
sequently took  irregular  meals  at  a  restaurant.  Sometimes,  when 
there  was  a  heated  debate,  he  would  not  get  his  dinner  till  half-past 
nine  at  night.  As  he  was  over  sixty  when  his  work  in  the  Board  of 
Education  began,  he  had  reached  a  time  when  such  irregularity  tells 
upon  a  man's  health.     Fatigue  often  kept  him  from  sleeping. 

At  the  beginning  of  his  presidency,  he  had  given  notice  that  he 
would  be  present  in  the  president's  room  between  the  hours  of  ir 
A.  M.  and  I  P.  M.  every  day,  for  the  purpose  of  receiving  visitors 
desiring  to  converse  with  him  in  reference  to  anything  connected 
with  the  cause  of  education,  officially  or  otherwise.  The  same  time 
on  Saturdays  was  reserved  for  the  visits  of  teachers  who  might  wish 
to  see  him  on  matters  connected  with  their  profession. 

These  hours  were  changed  on  September   20   to   those  between 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  445 

2  and  4  p.  M.,  because   he   found   the   first   named  hours  interfered 
materially  with  his  morning  visitations  of  the  schools. 

He  made  a  communication  to  the  board  on  November  i  relative 
to  boys  committed  to  Randall's  Island  as  truants,  which  exemplifies 
another  phase  of  his  work  as  president  : 

To  the  Board  of  Education  : 

"  Gentlemen  :  On  June  30  last,  by  virtue  of  authority  given 
to  me  by  resolution  of  the  board  passed  June  21,  1876,  page  492  of 
tlie  Journal,  I  set  free,  as  on  July  i,  the  boys  committed  to  Randall'g 
Island  as  truants,  and  in  durance  on  that  date,  amounting  to  sixty 
in  all.  I  did  this  partly  because  I  did  not  think  that  the  Institution 
for  the  Reformation  of  Juvenile  Delinquents  was  a  proper  and  suit- 
able place  for  the  detention  of  mere  truants.  Their  association  in 
that  institution  with  criminal  misdemeanants,  and  their  being  locked 
up  in  narrow  cells  for  the  night,  frequently  two  in  a  bed,  were  not 
calculated  to  work  any  reformation  in  them,  but  the  contrary  ;  and 
another  reason  was  that  during  July  and  August  no  boy  could  com- 
mit any  act  of  truancy,  inasmuch  as  all  the  common  schools  were 
closed  for  these  two  months. 

"  Therefore,  when  the  common  schools  reopened  on  Monday, 
September  4,  this  board  had  no  boys  in  confinement  as  truants,  nor 
have  they  any  to-day  ;  but  I  now  have  before  me  thirty-four  papers 
asking  for  the  taking  before  a  magistrate  for  committal  to  some 
reformatory  institution  thirty -four  truants.  These  papers  have  all 
been  signed  by  the  superintendent  of  truancy,  but  have  not  yet  been 
countersigned  by  me,  and  without  the  signature  of  the  president  of 
the  board  no  application  can  be  made  to  a  police  magistrate  for  the 
committal  of  any  truant  (see  Manual  of  1876,  page  242,  section  9). 
I  have  so  far  withheld  my  signature,  because  I  was  unwilling,  except 
in  case  of  extreme  profligacy  added  to  truancy,  to  send  any  child 
to  Randall's  Island,  and  because  I  entertained  the  hope  that  the  Board 
of  Apportionment  would  grant  us  the  one  hundred  thousand  dollars 
asked  for  in  the  budget  for  1877,  in  order  to  establish  a  reformatory 
school,  under  our  oivn  jurisdiction.  Pending  the  erection  and 
organization  of  such  a  school,  I  was  in  hopes  that,  if  we  got  the 
money  asked  for,  some  temporary  arrangement  might  be  made  for 
the  detention  of  our  truants  in  some  of  the  charitable  institutions, 


446  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

which  would  be  free  from  the  objections  I  have  to  that  on  Randall's 
Island. 

"  However,  I  see  from  this  morning's  papers  that  the  Board  of 
Apportionment  has  not  granted  us  the  one  hundred  thousand  dollars 
asked  for,  and  therefore  that  it  is  necessary  for  us  to  make  a  more 
than  temporary  arrangement  with  one  of  the  charitable  institutions 
to  which  I  have  referred.  One  of  these  is  the  New  York  Juvenile 
Asylum,  with  its  main  building  in  a  most  salubrious  situation  near 
High  Bridge,  and  with  a  well  arranged  House  of  Reception  in 
West  Thirteenth  Street,  immediately  opposite  Grammar  School 
No.  35. 

"  There  truant  and  vagrant  children  are  received  at  all  hours, 
boarded,  lodged,  and  instructed  for  the  few  days  that  they  may  be 
in  the  city,  and  are  forwarded  twice  a  week  to  the  large  parent 
asylum  at  High  Bridge. 

"This  admirable  institution  declined,  up  till  last  month,  to  take 
any  more  of  our  truants,  because  the  exercise  of  the  authority  of 
this  board,  in  reference  to  its  truants,  interfered  with  the  discipline 
of  other  inmates  of  the  asylum  ;  but  through  the  intervention  of 
Commissioner  David  Wetmore,  the  authorities  of  the  Juvenile 
Asylum  have  reconsidered  their  action,  and  have  now  intimated 
that  they  will  receive  and  care  for  our  truants. 

"  I  am,  therefore,  desirous  that  the  Committee  on  By-Laws  will,  with 
as  little  delay  as  possible,  take  this  matter  into  consideration,  and 
report  at  next  meeting  (if,  on  consideration,  they  deem  it  advisable), 
that  the  New  York  Juvenile  Asylum  shall  be,  until  further  orders, 
deemed  and  taken  to  be  '  such  reformatory  school  as  may  be  estab- 
lished by  the  Board  of  Education,'  specially  referred  to  in  page  243, 
section  10,  of  the  Manual,  and  that  said  Committee  on  By-Laws  have 
power  to  arrange  with  the  authorities  of  the  New  York  Juvenile 
Asylum  the  conditions  under  which  truants  shall  be  received,  cared 
for,  and  dismissed  from  that  institution. 

"  I  may  add  that  I  have  to-day  inspected,  from  basement  to  attic, 
the  House  of  Reception  in  West  Thirteenth  Street,  of  the  New  York 
Juvenile  Asylum,  and  also  its  large,  well-ventilated  dormitories,  and 
feel  entirely  satisfied  with  what  I  saw  there,  and  with  the  explana- 
tions which  I  there  received  regarding  the  system  upon  which  the 
Juvenile  Asylum  is  itself  conducted,  and  will  have  no  scruples  in 


CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.   ELIZABETH   D.    KANE.  447 

doing  my  part  to  have  habitual  truants  committed  to  the  care  of  its 
authorities. 

"  William  Wood." 

Ordered,  That  said  communication  be  referred  to  the  Committee 
on  By-Laws,  Elections,  and  Qualifications,  and  entered  in  full  in  the 
minutes. 

The  result  of  all  this  work  came  on  December  13.  Saturday,  the 
9th,  was  a  cold  windy  day.  President  Wood  spent  the  morning  at  the 
Normal  College,  remaining  until  he  had  finished  the  day's  business,  "  in 
spite  of  a  strange  feeling  of  tightness  in  the  head,  and  then  of  every- 
thing going  away  from  him."  He  walked  home  through  the  Central 
Park,  the  fresh  breeze  seeming  to  relieve  him.  But  he  did  not  look 
well,  had  a  nervous  chill  on  Monday  evening,  and  on  Tuesday 
morning  a  threatening  of  apoplexy,  the  second  within  six  weeks. 
This  ushered  in  an  acute  attack  of  inflammatory  rheumatism,  which 
passed  off  rapidly.  Dr.  Barker  did  not  think  it  advisable  for  him  to 
resign  from  the  board,  as  his  anxious  children  wished  him  to  do, 
but  counseled  his  declining  to  stand  for  the  presidency  again.  He 
accordingly  dictated  the  following  letter  : 

"  No.  4  West  Eighteenth  Street, 

"  New  York,  December  21,  1876. 

"  Gentlemen  of  the  Board  of  Education  : 

"  It  has  become  a  duty  which  is  personally  most  painful  to  me  to 
inform  you  that  I  shall  not  be  a  candidate  for  the  presidency  of  the 
board  for  the  yeai:  1877.  Some  weeks  ago,  in  conversing  with  a 
friend  in  regard  to  the  presidency  for  the  ensuing  year,  I  stated  to 
him  that  the  glory  and  honor  of  being  president  during  our  Centen- 
nial year  were  enough  to  gratify  the  highest  ambition  of  any  reasonable 
man.  This  was  my  opinion  when  I  was  in  perfect  health  ;  but  since 
then,  on  December  13,  I  was  suddenly  stricken  down  with  a  most 
serious  illness,  and  my  physician,  Dr.  Fordyce  Barker,  has  posi- 
tively forbidden  me  to  take  the  office  of  president  of  the  Board  of 
Education. 

"  I  have  therefore  no  longer  any  choice  in  the  matter,  and  can 
only  regret  that  I  did  not  sooner  decide  upon  withdrawing  from  the 


448  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

candidacy  so  as  to  give  you  a  longer  time  in  which  to  consummate 
your  choice. 

"  I  can  only  pray  that,  '  He  who  weighs  the  mountains  in  scales, 
and  the  hills  in  a  balance,  and  taketh  up  the  isles  as  a  very  little 
thing,'  will  preside  over  your  deliberations  and  guide  and  direct  your 
choice. 

"  I  think  that  under  the  peculiar  circumstances  of  the  case,  it  may 
not  be  unbecoming  in  me  to  say  that  the  duties  of  the  board  during 
this  Centennial  year  have  been  unusually  onerous.  At  all  times 
certain  committees,  such  as  those  on  Normal  College,  By-Laws, 
Supplies,  Course  of  Studies,  Teachers,  and  Finance,  have  very  heavy 
work  to  perform  and  to  assiduously  pursue.  This  year  a  new  course 
of  studies  had  to  be  devised  ;  and  the  members  of  the  Committee  on 
Course  of  Studies  have  had  many  long  protracted  and  wearisome 
meetings  in  order  to  enable  them  to  accomplish  this  most  important 
work.  While  the  By-Laws  Commitee,  besides  its  ordinary  work,  has 
had  in  hand  the  revision  and  reorganization  of  the  whole  of  our 
By-Laws,  it  has,  in  addition,  had  many  most  intricate  claims  from 
the  annexed  districts  and  parts  of  Westchester  adjacent  thereto,  to 
decide  upon. 

"  The  salaries  question  is  still  an  open  one.  The  Committee  on 
Salaries  and  Economy  laid  before  the  board  (see  pages  446,  447, 
448,  449,  and  450  of  the  Journal  for  1876)  a  scheme  for  the  equaliza- 
tion of  salaries  in  grammer  and  primary  schools  and  primary 
departments,  and  also  for  the  equal  assortment  of  scholars  to  each 
teacher  in  the  several  departments. 

"  The  sooner  that,  or  some  similar  plan,  is  adopted  the  better  for 
the  interests  of  education. 

"When  the  equalization  of  salaries  in  grammar  schools,  primary 
schools,  and  primary  departments  has  taken  place,  it  seems  to  me 
that  an  entire  change  in  the  mode  of  grading  the  scholars  in  the 
several  departments  should  be  adopted.  Instead  of  having  as  at 
present  six  (6)  grades  in  the  primary  schools  and  departments, 
ascending  from  the  sixth  to  the  first,  and  in  the  grammar  schools 
eight  (8)  grades,  ascending  from  the  eight  to  the  first,  I  would 
recommend  that  the  total  grades  in  both  departments  should 
be  fourteen  (14),  and  that  the  natural  sequence  should  be  followed, 
beginning  with  the  first  and  lowest  class  or  grade  in  the  primary  and 


CONTINUATION   BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.    KANE.  449 

ascending  to  the  highest  grade   in  the  grammar  school,  which  would 
be  the  fourteenth  grade. 

"  The  equalization  of  the  salaries  in  the  several  departments  being 
made,  and  the  grades  arranged  as  I  have  indicated,  the  question 
next  in  order  would  be  the  arrangement  of  each  school  building  in 
such  a  manner  as  to  meet  the  requirements  of  this  new  grading  and 
classification.  By  this  plan  each  school  building  could  ultimately  be 
placed  under  one  principal,  and  a  very  great  saving  of  money 
effected  in  the  supervision  of  the  schools.  Such  arrangements  as  I 
contemplate  I  would  advocate  only  for  ih.&  future,  leaving  what  may 
be  called  vested  interests  untouched.  But  I  would  inaugurate  a 
system  by  which,  when  resignations  or  deaths  occur,  each  school 
building  should  have  but  one  principal,  and  under  him  or  her  a 
vice-principal  in  each  department.  In  the  organizations  of  new 
schools,  a  by-law  of  the  board  should  enforce  this  efficient  and 
economical  mode  of  supervision. 

"  A  school  building  no  more  needs  three  principals  than  a  ship 
needs  three  captains.  If  this  plan  were  carried  out,  no  teacher 
now  in  the  schools  would  suffer  in  position  or  salary,  and  there 
would  be  eventually  saved  to  the  city  about  $173,000  per 
annum. 

"While  the  Board  of  Education  had  no  colleges  under  its  super- 
vision, it  was  eminently  proper  that  a  special  agency  should  be  pro- 
vided for  the  examination  and  licensing  of  teachers,  and  that  that 
agency  should  be  filled  by  the  City  Superintendent  of  Schools  ;  but 
now  that  we  have  the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York  for  the  higher 
education  of  young  men,  and  the  Normal  College  for  the  higher 
education  of  young  women,  it  must  strike  every  impartial  observer 
that  the  use  of  a  special  agency  for  the  examination  of  teachers  and 
the  granting  of  licenses  to  them  is  absolutely  unnecessary,  and  that 
if  the  faculties  of  the  respective  colleges  are  competent  to  perform 
their  duties,  to  them,  and  them  alone,  the  examination  of  teachers 
and  the  granting  of  licenses  should  be  confided  ;  and  in  fact 
that  the  diploma  of  each  college  should  carry  along  with  it  the 
license  to  teach  without  any  other  credential  ;  and  that  when  any 
candidate  for  a  teacher's  license  has  not  graduated  at  either  college, 
that  license  should  be  granted  to  the  young  man  passing  the  required 
examination  before  the  faculty  of  the  College  of  the  City  of  New 


450  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

York,  or  to  the  young  woman  passing  such  examination  before  the 
faculty  of  the  Normal  College. 

"  With  regard  to  the  appointment  of  teachers,  my  experience  for 
a  period  of  nearly  seven  years  leads  me  to  the  belief  that  the 
present  system  is  a  bad  one.  We  commissioners  are  held  responsi- 
ble for  the  well  working  of  the  whole  common  school  system  of  the 
city,  yet  we  have  not  the  direct  appointment  of  a  single  teacher  in 
that  system.  I  am  of  opinion  that  the  appointment  of  principal 
and  vice  principal  should  be  vested  in  this  board  absolutely,  and  that 
with  regard  to  the  appointment  of  assistant  teachers,  while  I  would 
allow  the  nomination  of  such  to  remain  with  the  trustees  of  the 
several  wards,  the  confirmation  should  inhere  in  the  Board  of  Edu- 
cation. In  other  words,  all  appointments,  transfers,  and  promotions 
should  be  confirmed  by  the  board  on  the  report  of  the  Committee 
on  Teachers,  precisely  in  a  similar  manner  to  that  pursued  in  the 
case  of  the  teachers  of  the  evening  schools.  I  would  add  a  further 
guarantee  to  the  eligibility  of  all  teachers,  and  that  is  that  each 
teacher  nominated  by  a  board  of  trustees  should  appear  before  the 
Committee  on  Teachers  before  he  or  she  is  confirmed  by  the  board, 
so  that  the  members  of  that  important  committee  may  be  them- 
selves satisfied,  so  far  as  outward  appearance  goes,  respecting  those  to 
whom  they  are  confiding  the  most  important  interests  of  the  thou- 
sands of  young  children  committed  to  our  care. 

"  I  have  long  felt  that  there  was  something  wrong  about  the 
organization  of  the  evening  schools.  It  seems  to  me  that  the 
grading,  classification,  regularity,  and  punctuality,  and  general  in- 
struction in  this  class  of  schools  have  not  been  satisfactory,  nor 
have  the  results  corresponded  with  the  amount  of  money  expended. 
Evening  schools  were  never  intended  for  mere  children,  nor  to 
afford  careless  parents  an  excuse  for  taking  their  young  children  out 
of  the  day  schools  at  a  very  tender  age  and  setting  them  to  work 
for  a  small  pittance.  These  schools  were  established  for  young  men 
and  young  women,  or  for  well-grown  boys  and  girls,  to  enable  them, 
after  a  day's  toil,  to  acquire  that  education  which  was  denied  to 
them  in  childhood  by  orphanage  or  extreme  poverty.  To  put  a  pre- 
mium on  the  taking  of  children  out  of  day  schools  is  mischievous 
in  the  extreme.  In  fact,  in  a  moral  point  of  view,  it  is  a  great  error 
to  have  boys  and  girls,  at   the  age  of  twelve  years,  away  from  their 


CONTINUATION   BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  45 1 

homes  between  the  hours  of  nine  and  ten  o'clock  in  the  evening. 
They  would  be  much  better  in  bed  asleep.  I  would  allow  no  child 
under  fourteen  years  old  to  attend  any  evening  school.  This  would 
be  my  first  reform.  For  the  purpose  of  making  the  evening 
schools  effective  and  economical,  I  would  recommend  the  following 
regulations  : 

"  First.  Inform  the  principals  that  the  board  requires,  not  so 
much  a  vast  assemblage  of  pupils  as  a  thoroughly  organized,  graded, 
and  classified  school. 

"  Second.  No  pupil  under  twenty-one  years  of  age  shall  be 
admitted  unless  accompanied  by  his  parent  or  guardian,  who  will 
be  responsible  for  his  attendance  and  conduct.  Each  pupil  shall  be 
admitted  with  a  ticket,  which  will  be  withdrawn  for  misbehavior. 

"  Third.  Orphans,  half  orphans,  and  the  children  of  sick  or  dis- 
abled parents,  under  the  age  of  fourteen,  might  be  admitted  to  the 
evening  schools  upon  a  certificate  proving  the  fact.  A  discretionary 
power  might  be  vested  in  the  Committee  on  Evening  Schools  to 
admit  children  between  the  ages  of  twelve  and  fourteen. 

**  Fourth.  The  board  should  employ  about  eight  'absentee  runners  ' 
to  promptly  inform  parents  and  guardians  whenever  their  children 
or  wards  are  absent  from  school.  Statistics  prove  that  more  than 
half  the  number  registered  use  the  evening  schools  as  a  medium  to 
deceive  their  parents,  while  they  (the  children)  are  learning  vice  in 
the  public  streets.  The  employment  of  these  runners  would  be  an 
act  of  wise  economy. 

"  Fifth.  I  would  subject  these  evening  schools  to  repeated  exami- 
nations, and  whe;"e  there  was  a  great  falling  off  in  the  attendance  I 
would  hold  the  principals  and  teachers  to  a  strict  accountability. 
In  a  word,  I  would  either  make  these  schools  efficient  or  I  would 
abolish  them. 

"  Sixth.  I  would  raise  the  standard  for  admission  to  the  Evening 
High  School  and  promote  the  pupils  of  the  ordinary  evening  schools 
to  the  High  School  by  regular  competitive  examination,  just  as  we 
do  now  in  the  Normal  College  and  the  College  of  the  City  of  New 
York.  I  have  been  much  exercised  about  these  evening  schools, 
for,  with  the  exception  of  the  Evening  High  School,  which  has 
achieved  magnificent  results,  they  appear  to  me  to  be  the  one  weak 
spot  in   the  system  of  common  schools.     I  do  hope  that  the  board 


452  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

will  seriously  consider  how  these  evening  schools  can  be  made  more 
effective. 

"  The  Normal  College  graduated  233  teachers  out  of  a  total  of 
235  under  examination.  The  examination  was  severe,  exact,  and 
incisive.  I  doubt  if  such  results  have  ever  been  achieved  in  any 
similar  institution  in  this  or  any  other  country.  The  young  ladies 
were  obliged  to  take  an  average  of  75  per  cent,  in  thirteen  different 
studies  ;  and  although  successful  in  passing  this  ordeal,  if  they  failed 
to  take  75  per  cent,  in  English  grammar  or  arithmetic,  or  80  per  cent, 
in  spelling,  they  failed  to  graduate.  Already,  even  in  its  infancy, 
has  this  institution  gained  for  itself  a  world-wide  reputation. 

"  I  trust  that  the  board  will  extend  to  it  in  the  future,  as  in  the 
past,  their  cordial  sympathy  and  support  as  the  crowning  glory  of 
our  system  of  free  common  schools. 

"  Gentlemen,  I  request  that  you  will  excuse  my  absence  at  this 
meeting,  and  also  my  probable  absence  at  the  first  meeting  in  Jan- 
uary, as  I  do  not  feel  that  I  shall  be  able  to  resume  the  per- 
formance of  even  my  ordinary  duties  as  commissioner  before  the 
meeting  of  January  24. 

"I  am,  gentlemen,  with  gratitude  for  all  your  past  kindnesses, 
"  Your  most  obedient  servant, 

"William  Wood." 

On  motion  of  Commissioner  Halsted,  the  request  of  the  president 
to  be  excused  was  granted,  and  the  communication  ordered  to  be 
entered  in  full  in  the  minutes. 

Commissioner  Baker,  by  unanimous  consent,  offered  the  follow- 
ing resolutions: 

"Whereas,  The  President  of  this  Board,  Hon.  William  Wood,  has 
forwarded  a  communication  declining  to  be  a  candidate  for  the  presi- 
dency of  the  board  for  the  ensuing  year,  under  the  advice  of  his 
physician  :    and 

"Whereas,  The  cause  of  his  declination  is  impaired  health,  occa- 
sioned largely,  if  not  wholly,  by  his  zealous,  faithful,  and  devoted 
attention  to  the  duties  of  his  office  :  now,  therefore, 

"  Resolved,  That  we,  the  members  of  the  Board  of  Education,  do 
severally  and  ^collectively  hereby  tender  our  heartfelt  sympathy  to 
our  honored  and   beloved  president  and  his   family,  in  the  earnest 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  453 

hope  that,  through  Divine  mercy,  he  may  soon  be  restored  to  per- 
fect health  and  vigor,  and  thus  be  enabled  to  resume  his  official 
duties,  and  to  renew  the  pleasant  relations  which  have  endeared  him 
to  us,  his  associate  commissioners. 

"  Resolved,  That  in  President  Wood  our  system  of  education  has  a 
sound  and  efficient  chief  executive,  a  firm  friend,  and  a  consistent 
and  indefatigable  supporter,  and  that  we  hereby  respectfully  but 
earnestly  request  him,  for  the  benefit  of  our  schools,  if  possible,  to 
forego  the  determination  conveyed  in  his  communication  of  this  date. 

"  Resolved,  That  the  clerk  of  this  board  be  authorized  and  directed 
to  present  personally  a  copy  of  these  preambles  and  resolutions  to 
President  Wood." 

The  president  pro  tern,  put  the  question  whether  the  board  would 
adopt  said  resolutions,  and  it  was  decided  in  the  affirmative. 

Commissioner  Beardslee,  by  unanimous  consent,  offered  the  fol- 
lowing : 

"  Resolved,  That  the  thanks  of  this  board  be,  and  are  hereby  ten- 
dered to  William  Wood,  Esq.,  President  of  the  Board,  for  the  im- 
partial and  dignified  manner  in  which  he  has  presided  over  its 
deliberations,  for  the  intelligent,  earnest  and  unwearied  devotion  he 
has  bestowed  upon  the  interests  committed  to  its  charge,  and  for 
the  eminently  able,  zealous,  and  faithful  attention  he  has  given  to 
the  performance  of  the  duties  of  his  office;  and  that  the  members  of 
the  board  associated  with  him  do  hereby  express  their  profound 
sorrow  and  regret  to  learn  of  his  present  illness,  and  their  sincere 
hope  that  he  will  soon  be  restored  to  the  enjoyment  of  his  usual 
good  health,  and  to  the  great  usefulness  he  has  been  accustomed  to 
exercise  in  the  cause  of  public  education." 

The  president /r^  tern,  put  the  question  whether  tlie  board  would 
adopt  said  resolution,  and  it  was  decided  in  the  affirmative. 

Commissioner  Kane,  by  unanimous  consent,  offered  the  following  : 

"'Resolved,  That  the  clerk  of  this  board  cause  to  be  printed  a  suffi- 
cient number  of  copies  of  the  communication  from  the  president  to 
supply  each  of  the  principals  and  teachers  of  the  public  schools." 

The  president //-(^/cw.  put  the  question  whether  the  board  would 
adopt  said  resolution,  and  it  was  decided  in  the  affirmative. 


454  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

The  following  editorial  appeared  in  the  New  York  Herald, 
December  31,  1876: 

"  MAKE    AN    EXAMPLE    OF    HIM. 

"  President  Wood,  of  our  city  Board  of  Education,  declines  re- 
nomination  on  the  ground  of  ill-health,  and  he  is  not  a  man  to  say 
anything  which  he  does  not  mean.  But  the  board,  by  unanimous 
vote,  begs  Mr.  Wood  to  reconsider  his  intention,  and  the  people 
will  strongly  indorse  the  resolutions.  Even  should  Mr.  Wood  be- 
come entirely  unfit  for  duty  he  should  be  re-elected  if  only  that  he 
may  be  kept  before  the  public  as  an  example  to  other  men  of  wealth 
and  culture.  Criticisms  from  such  men  are  numberless  regarding 
education  and  other  matters  of  great  local  importance,  and  they  are 
often  just ;  but  when  actual  work  is  necessary  these  gentlemen  draw 
on  their  gloves  and  recall  a  pressing  engagement.  Mr.  Wood,  on 
the  contrary,  has  for  years  devoted  his  entire  time  to  the  improve- 
ment of  our  schools  ;  he  has  mastered  the  system  even  in  its  driest 
and  minutest  details;  he  has  done  his  best  with  the  material  at  his 
service,  instead  of  enshrouding  himself  in  elegant  longings  after  the 
unattainable,  and  he  has  been  rewarded  by  the  success  which  always 
follows  intelligent  endeavor.  New  York  has  a  thousand  or  more 
other  men  who  could  and  should  follow  in  President  Wood's  foot- 
steps, and  in  the  various  departments  of  local  administration  there 
is  room  for  all  of  them.  Let  Mr.  Wood  be  kept  before  the  public 
until  other  men  of  similar  abilities  are  shamed  into  true  loyalty." 

William  Wood,  however,  was  re-elected  president  of  the  Board  of 
Education,  and  on  taking  the  chair  January  10,  1877,  addressed  the 
board  as  follows  : 

"  Getitlemen  of  the  Board  of  Education : 

"Five  and  twenty  days  ago  I  had  very  little  expectation  of  ever 
being  in  this  room  again,  certainly  not  of  occupying  this  place.  It 
has  pleased  Providence  to  restore  me  to  health,  and  although  I  feel 
somewhat  weak  and  nervous,  yet  I  hope  I  shall  be  able  to  discharge 
the  duties  of  this  important  office  without  any  loss  to  the  Board  of 
Education.  At  all  events  you  may  depend  upon  it  that  I  shall  do 
my  very  best  to  fulfill  the  duties  of  the  place,  and  I  trust  if  I  do  at 
all  fall  away  from  the  duties  that  I  shall  be  forgiven  on   account  of 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  455 

the  illness  through  which  I  have  passed,  but  from  which  I  am 
rapidly  recovering.  Feeling,  as  I  remarked  before,  not  very  strong, 
I  think  that  instead  of  speaking  without  note  or  comment,  I  should 
confine  myself  to  paper  about  certain  questions,  and  you  will  pardon 
ray  reading  what  I  am  about  to  say. 

"  Gentlemen,  besides  the  dislike  to  change  a  determination  once 
expressed,  there  was  a  natural  desire  on  my  part  to  rest  satisfied 
with  the  laurels  so  liberally  bestowed  upon  me  by  the  resolutions 
of  December  20.     But  I  remembered  the  line  of  the  great   Marquis 

of  Montrose  : 

"  '  He  either  fears  his  fate  too  much, 
Or  his  deserts  are  small, 
Who  dares  not  put  it  to  the  touch, 
To  gain  or  lose  it  all.' 

And,  besides,  after  the  kind  and  handsome  manner  in  which  the 
board  had  dealt  with  me,  I  felt  it  to  be  my  imperative  duty  to  obey 
its  behests,  and  so,  after  waiting  ten  days  to  ascertain  if  my  recovery 
were  certain,  I  wrote,  on  December  30,  to  my  friend  the  clerk  of 
the  board,  withdrawing  by  declination  to  stand  again  for  the  presi- 
dency, and,  as  a  result,  I  once  more  occupy,  through  your  kindness, 
the  highly  honorable  ofifice  of  president  of  the  board. 

"  It  is  usual  to  give  an  inaugural  address,  but  you  will  be  happy, 
I  am  sure,  to  escape  in  part  the  infliction,  and  be  indulgent  enough 
to  agree  that  my  valedictory  of  December  20,  1876,  shall  be  deemed 
and  taken  to  be  a  part  of  this  inaugural  of  January  10,  1877.  In 
fact,  that  address  was  prepared  in  the  anticipation  that  the  board 
would  confirm  ofificially  the  sentiments  personally  expressed  at  the 
time  as  to  their  purposes.  My  own  time  being  very  much  occupied, 
I  spent  a  leisure  evening,  about  the  end  of  November,  and  taking 
time  by  the  forelock,  wrote  out  then  what  I  intended  to  say  notv. 
But  my  severe  illness  changed  all  this,  and  I  had  to  turn  my  in- 
tended inaugural  into  a  valedictory,  so  that  my  address,  like  that  re- 
markable piece  of  furniture  in  Goldsmith's  '  Deserted  Village,'  has 

"  'contrived  a  double  debt  to  pay, 
A  bed  by  night,  a  chest  of  drawers  by  day.' 

''  I  shall  only  add,  therefore,  to  my  valedictory  a  few  supplemen- 
tary remarks. 

"  I    have  enumerated   various   principles   in   my   communication, 


456  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

none  of  which  are  particularlj'  new,  and  all  of  them  have,  no  doubt, 
separately  presented  themselves  to  the  minds  of  my  colleagues.  I 
have  grouped  them  together,  that  they  might  be  presented  with 
greater  force.  If  my  address  be,  as  usual,  referred  to  the  appro- 
priate committees,  and  should  they  present  it  in  whole,  or  in  part, 
for  the  adoption  of  the  board,  and  it  should  be  so  adopted,  then  it  is 
evident  that  further  legislation  will  be  necessary  to  carry  the  prin- 
ciples which  I  have  advocated  into  practice. 

"  This  legislation  should  be  initiated  by  ourselves,  and  we  are  for- 
tunate in  having  a  committee  on  by-laws  well  qualified  to  draft  such 
a  bill  as,  when  adopted  by  this  board,  would  be  certain  to  be  passed 
into  a  law  by  the  Legislature. 

"  Gentlemen,  only  yesterday  did  I  become  acquainted  with  the 
discourteous  manner  in  which  this  board  has  been  treated  by  the 
Board  of  Apportionment.  x\fter  having  the  budget  carefully  pre- 
pared by  us,  before  it,  since  September  last,  on  the  tJnrtieth  of 
December,  without  any  intimation  to  this  board,  or  consultation 
with  it,  the  Board  of  Apportionment  reduced  our  budget  for  1877 
by  S335'352.  I  was  ill,  and  confined  to  my  room,  but  Commis- 
sioner Dowd,  the  chairman  of  the  Finance  Committee,  himself  an 
eminent  financier  and  pronounced  economist,  was  at  his  post  ready 
to  render  the  Board  of  Apportionment  every  information  had  he 
been  asked  for  it,  but  710,  that  board  proceeded,  in  its  own  rude 
and  rough  manner,  to  reduce  our  budget,  apparently  without  any 
standard  of  comparison,  but  only  a  determination  to  cut  off  some- 
thing and  anyhow. 

"We  asked  to  pay  salaries,  $2,780,752.  From  this  the  Board  of 
Apportionment  cuts  off  the  odd  $80,782,  without  a  reason — 
reducing  the  allowance  for  salaries  to  $2,700,000. 

"  The  next  item  for  books,  rent,  fuel,  gas,  incidentals,  compul- 
sory education,  nautical  school,  in  our  budget,  was  $511,000.  The 
Board  of  Apportionment  apparently  thought  $11,000  too  little  to 
slice  off,  so  they  threw  in  $50,000  more,  and  deducted  $61,000  ; 
leaving  us  to  cover  these  various  expenditures  the  sum  of  $450,000. 

"  The  next  item  is  a  cutting  off  of  $2000  from  the  $105,000 
allowed  by  the  Legislature  for  the  corporate  schools.  This  we  have 
nothing  to  do  with,  as  we  merely  serve  as  a  conduit-pipe  to  convey 
the  bounty  of  the   Legislature  to   those   several  institutions,  and  it 


CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.    KANE.  457 

seems  to  me  tliat  the  Board  of  Apportionment  has  no  right  to  inter- 
fere with  these  matters. 

"The  next  item  in  our  budget  is  $491,600  for  purchasing  of  sites, 
erecting  buildings,  furniture,  and  repairs.  From  this  the  Board  of 
Apportionment  have  cut  off  ^ipij^oo,  in  a  perfectly  reckless  man- 
ner, without  the  slightest  consideration  for  the  absolute  wants  and 
necessities  of  the  children  of  the  city  of  New  York. 

"  Thus  our  total  budget  is  reduced  from  $3,888,352  1013,553,000. 

"The  salaries  of  teachers.  Normal  College,  janitors,  superin- 
tendent, and  assistant  superintendents,  based  upon  the  payrolls  for 
November  and  December,  1876,  would  amount  alone  to  $2,775,200, 
and  this  actual  output  justifies  the  estimate  of  $2,780,652,  submitted 
to  the  Board  of  Apportionment  last  September,  and  leaves  no  room 
for  the  growth  and  expansion  of  the  system  during  1877.  But,  as 
I  have  already  stated,  this  carefully  prepared  estimate  has  been 
recklessly  reduced  by  the  last  act  of  the  Board  of  Apportionment, 
December  30,  1876,  by  $80,752  ! 

"  The  entire  average  attendance  in  the  primary  and  grammar 
schools  in  1876  was  113,614,  and  the  whole  number  taught  229,053. 
The  increase  in  the  average  attendance  of  pupils  in  grammar  and 
primary  schools  over  the  attendance  in  1875  was  about  2600  ;  in 
the  Normal  College  and  Training  Department,  460  ;  while  there  has 
been  a  decrease  of  about  11 00  pupils  in  the  evening  and  colored 
schools. 

"The  deduction  by  the  Board  of  Apportionment  of  $191,000 
from  our  estimates  for  sites,  new  buildings,  etc.,  will  prevent  their 
providing  additional  accommodation  for  pupils  so  much  wanted  in 
the  upper  wards  of  our  city.  The  compulsory  law  says  :  '  Send 
your  children  to  school  or  we  will  imprison  them.'  The  Board  of 
Apportionment  practically  says:  'You  shall  not  have  the  addi- 
tional accommodation  necessary,  and  you  may  imprison  the  children 
if  you  choose,  or  let  them  roam  the  streets,  to  grow  up  thieves  and 
vagabonds.'  And  for  this  no  reason  is  vouchsafed,  and  we  are 
therefore  thrown  back  on  the  tyrant's  plea,  '  Sic  volo,  sic  jubeo,  stet 
pro  ratione  voluntas,'  and  this  is  not  Turkey  or  China,  but  the 
imperial  city  of  the  greatest  republic  that  ever  existed,  and  in  the 
last  quarter  of  the  nineteenth  century  ! 

"  Gentlemen,  what   remedy  have  we   for   this    state   of   matters  ? 


458  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

We  who  have  devoted  our  days  and  nights  without  fee  or  reward  to 
perfect  our  system  of  !)ablic  education,  and  to  reduce  its  cost  to  a 
minimum  without  impairing  its  efficiency  ?  Our  united  labors  are 
overthrown  by  the  fiat  of  four  men,  who  have  not  bestowed  one 
hundredth  part  of  the  attention  which  we  have  upon  the  important 
subject  at  issue. 

"  Gentlemen,  A  by-law  of  the  board  decrees  that  the  office  of 
president  ceases  on  the  31st  of  December  of  the  year  in  which  he  is 
elected.  The  result  is  that  every  year  from  the  ist  of  January  to 
the  second  Wednesday  of  January  there  is  an  interregnum,  and  the 
board  has  no  president,  yet  certain  matters  require  the  action  of  the 
president, — among  others  the  liberation  of  truants,  all  of  whom  must 
necessarily  be  kept  in  confinement  during  the  interregnum  to  which 
I  have  referred.  I  think  this  by-law  ought  to  be  amended  and 
brought  into  harmony  with  that  of  the  Board  of  Trustees  of  the 
College  of  the  City  of  New  York,  where  the  chairman  of  the  board 
holds  over  until  his  successor  is  elected. 

"  Gentlemen,  I  beg  leave  to  give  notice  that  on  and  after  Monday, 
15th  of  January,  it  is  my  intention  to  be  present  as  heretofore,  in 
the  president's  room,  daily,  between  the  hours  of  2  and  4  p.  M.,  for 
the  purpose  of  receiving  visitors  who  may  desire  to  converse  with 
me  in  reference  to  anything  connected  with  the  cause  of  education, 
officially  or  otherwise. 

"  The  two  hours  between  2  and  4  p.  m.,  on  Saturday,  will  be 
reserved  exclusively  for  the  reception  of  teachers  who  may  wish  to 
see  me  regarding  any  matter  connected  with  their  profession." 

The  president  was  ready  at  once  to  set  lance  in  rest,  in  spite  of 
his  daughters'  protests.  An  old  letter  from  one  of  them,  found 
between  the  leaves  of  his  commonplace  book,  says: 

"  I  congratulate  you  on  your  unanimous  re-election  to  the  presi- 
dency ;  but  I  do  not  think  you  are  going  the  right  way  to  work  by 
promptly  entering  into  a  fight  with  the  Board  of  Apportionment.  You 
tnust  not  work  ;  but  you  must  bear  in  mind  that  our  consent  to  your 
becoming  president  again  was  given  on  the  understanding  that  you 
were  to  act  as  balance-wheel  only.  Your  fellow-commissioners  urged 
that  the  board  could  only  act  harmoniously  under  your  presidency. 

"  Do  be  quiet — if  it's  only  for  six  months  !     Dear  fellow,  it  isn't  a 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  459 

joking  remonstrance  any  more  that  your  doctor  and  friends  make  : 
it's  sober,  savage  earnestness.  I  must  say,  that  to  me  the  cause  of 
education  is  of  infinitely  less  value  than  the  life  of  my  dear  father  ; 
the  keeping  up  of  the  family,  which  will  be  broken  when  he  dies. 
Poor  little  Nell  and  Van  Home,  and  even  Harriet,  in  spite  of  the 
burden  she  feels  housekeeping,  would  find  the  loss  of  your  love 
awfully  deepened  by  the  loss  of  home.  Think  of  them,  and  don  t  try 
how  strong  you  are,  rejoicing  because  you  can  do  this  or  that.  Thank 
God  that  he  has  given  you  so  gentle  a  warning,  and  left  you  in  full 
control  of  your  mind  and  body  ;  but  don't  neglect  the  hint,  lest  a 
worse  one  be  required. 

"  Another  thing  :  no  going  off  to  open  Normal  College  at  9  a.  m. 
You  must  just  sit  still  in  your  library  for  a  couple  of  hours  after 
breakfast." 

The  exhortation  did  not  bear  much  fruit.  My  father  was  again 
elected  chairman  of  the  Board  of  Trustees  of  the  College  of  the 
City  of  New  York,  on  January  16,  1877,  and  thereupon  delivered  an 
address — a  remarkably  short  one,  however  : 

"  Gentlemen  :  Accept  my  heartfelt  thanks  for  the  honor  you 
have  done  me  in  re-electing  me  to  the  honorable  position  of  chair- 
man of  your  body. 

"  It  has  been  the  custom  for  the  newly  elected  chairman  of  the 
Board  of  Trustees  of  the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York  to  deliver 
an  inaugural  address. 

"I  followed  the  example  of  my  predecessors  last  year,  but  on  the 
present  occasion  I  intend  to  deviate  from  it,  although  I  possess 
ample  materials  for  an  address  upon  the  state  and  prospects  of  our 
college,  and  with  regard  to  the  best  means  of  utilizing  the  funds  so 
munificently  placed  at  our  disposal  by  the  Legislature  for  carrying 
out  the  legitimate  objects  for  which  the  college  was  instituted. 

"  Gentlemen,  you  are  aware  that  during  the  past  year  the  aca- 
demical calm  of  the  college  has  been  somewhat  ruffled  by  the  action 
of  the  Executive  Committee.  When  the  special  matter  to  which  I 
refer  was  adjusted,  the  Executive  Committee  proceeded  further  in 
what  it  considered  the  line  of  its  duty  and  for  the  best  interests  of 
the  college,  and  when  I  was  recently  taken  seriously  ill,  certain  in- 
vestigations were  pending  before  it,  which  have  in  a  measure  been 


460  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

interrupted   by   my   illness,   and   also   by    the    approaching    annual 
reorganization  of  the  Board  of  Trustees. 

"  Gentlemen,  Thomas  Carlyle  has  well  said  that,  '  Speech  is 
silveren,  but  silence  is  golden.'  This  apothegm,  it  appears  to  me, 
is  peculiarly  applicable  to  the  present  position  of  the  affairs  of  the 
College  of  the  City  of  New  York,  and  I  have  therefore  determined 
to  act  upon  it,  and  say  nothing  further  here  regarding  them." 

I  have  no  means  of  knowing  whether  the  chairman  attended  the 
twelve  meetings  of  this  board,  but  as  president  of  the  Board  of  Edu- 
cation he  was  present,  and  took  part  in  everyone  of  the  twenty- 
eight  meetings  of  the  year. 

Tlie  French  citizens  of  New  York,  through  Frederic  R.  Coudert, 
notified  the  president  of  the  Board  of  Education  that  a  gold  watch 
would  be  presented  to  the  best  student  in  the  French  department  of 
the  Normal  College,  after  the  next  annual  examination.  In  laying 
the  communication  before  the  board,  my  father  supplemented  it 
with  one  from  himself  : 

"  New  York,  September  4,  1877. 

"  Gentlemen  :  I  am  desirous  of  being  allowed,  as  long  as  I 
choose,  to  give  as  a  prize,  to  the  second  best  student  of  French  in 
the  Normal  College,  the  sum  of  forty  dollars  in  gold,  until  the 
French  citizens  of  New  York  have  raised  among  themselves  a 
sufificient  sum  to  give  a  yearly  income  of  forty  dollars  in  gold  for  the 
purpose  above  stated.* 

"  Trusting  that  you  will  grant  the  permission  I  ask  for, 
"  I  am,  gentlemen, 

"  Your  most  obedient  servant, 

"  William  Wood." 

It  was  on  April  18  that  John  Grenville  Kane  resigned  from  the 
board.  The  board  passed  the  following  resolution  offered  by  Com- 
missioner Walker  : 

"  Whereas,  The  board  has  been  to-day  advised  of  the  resignation 
from  its  membership  of  Commissioner  John  Grenville  Kane,  which 
has  been  necessitated  by  his  continued  ill-health, 

*  The  permission  being  given,  and  the  French  citizens  of  New  York  not  having 
raised  the  sum,  William  Wood  continued  to  "  choose"  to  give  the  forty  dollars 
in  gold.     The  last  presentation  was  in  June,  1894. 


CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.    KANE.  46 1 

"  Resolved,  That  the  members  of  the  Board  of  Education  desire 
to  express  and  to  place  upon  the  minutes  their  testimony  to  the 
earnestness,  diligence,  and  discretion  manifested  by  Commissioner 
Kane  in  all  his  labors  in  connection  with  this  board  ;  and  further,  to 
record  an  expression  of  sincere  regret  that  the  severance  of  our 
ofificial  relations  is  due  to  so  sad  a  cause.  It  is  our  earnest  hope  that 
restored  health  may  at  an  early  day  again  permit  him  to  give  his 
leisure,  ability,  and  culture  in  some  worthy  capacity  to  the  public 
service." 

John  G.  Kane  died  on  July  5,  1877.  His  gold  medal  still  "keeps 
his  memory  green  "  in  the  college,  year  by  year. 

Father's  sister  Anna,  Mrs.  William  Cross,  died  in  1878,  but  I  have 
not  the  actual  date  of  her  death.  She  was  a  remarkably  intellectual, 
as  well  as  a  witty,  v/oman,  much  cleverer  than  her  sister  Mary,  Mrs. 
Ferguson.  The  latter  was  chiefly  noted  for  her  sweetness  of  temper 
and  goodness. 

Father  was  re-elected  president  of  the  Board  of  Education  in 
1878,  after  a  somewhat  hotly  contested  election,  six  ballots  being 
cast.  The  other  prominent  candidate  was  William  H.  Wickham,  the 
ex-mayor  and  John  G.  Kane's  successor  as  commissioner. 

Remarks  of  William  Wood,  Esq.,  on  assuming  the  presidency  of 
the  Board  of  Education,  January  9,  1878  : 

"  Gentlemen  :  I  have  to  thank  you  for  this  renewed  instance  of 
the  confidence  you  have  in  me,  by  electing  me  for  a  third  time  to 
the  office  of  president  of  the  Board  of  Education  of  this  great  city, 
an  office  which  I  hold  second  to  none  in  honor  and  dignity  within 
the  municipality. 

During  the  past  year,  I  can  say  with  perfect  truth,  and  I  do  so 
with  the  greatest  pleasure,  that  the  Commissioners  of  Education  have 
performed  their  arduous  and  unremitting  duties  with  the  utmost  zeal 
and  ability.  These  duties  have  oftentimes  been  of  a  very  irksome 
kind,  because  we  have  had  to  struggle  with  a  reduced  budget  in  the 
face  of  a  large  access  of  scholars  to  the  schools,  and  consequently 
of  a  corresponding  demand  for  more  teachers  and  ampler  accommo- 
dations. For  the  year  1877,  we  were  allowed  $335,352  less  than  we 
asked  for,  and  $153,000  less  than  for  1876. 


462  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  The  question  of  meeting  the  financial  difficulty  was  referred  to 
the  Committee  on  Salaries  and  Economy,  on  January  10,  1877. 

"On  February  7,  said  committee  made  a  report  which,  when 
amended,  advised  an  application  to  the  Legislature  for  an  alteration 
of  the  existing  law,  so  as  to  authorize  applications  for  transfers  of 
specific  appropriations  by  the  Board  of  Estimate  and  Apportionment, 
on  the  application  of  the  Board  of  Education,  in  the  same  manner  as 
allowed  by  law  in  respect  to  departments  of  the  city  government. 
The  bill  intended  to  carry  out  this  idea  was  passed  by  the  State 
Senate,  but  was  not  acted  upon  by  the  Assembly.  However,  the 
result  aimed  at  by  it  has  been  attained,  at  least  for  this  year,  by  the 
action  of  the  Board  of  Estimate  and  Apportionment  in  giving  our 
funds  en  bloc,  instead  of  en  detail,  and  for  this  I  presume  we  are 
indebted  to  Commissioner  Wickham  ;  at  least,  I  remember  that  about 
eighteen  months  ago,  during  his  mayoralty,  he  stated  that  this  was 
the  manner  in  which  he  thought  our  apportionment  should  be  granted. 

"  On  February  26,  1877,  the  Committee  on  Salaries  and  Economy 
submitted  for  the  approval  of  the  board  the  report  of  a  sub-committee, 
appointed  by  them  to  consider  and  report  a  plan  to  cover  the  deficiency 
occasioned  by  the  action  of  the  Board  of  Estimate  and  Apportion- 
ment, in  reducing  the  appropriation  for  salaries  of  teachers  and  others 
employed  under  the  Board  of  Education  from  $2,780,752  to  $2,700- 
000.  The  sub-committee  presented  an  elaborate  and  carefully 
digested  plan  for  the  readjustment  of  salaries  of  teachers  and  other 
employees  of  the  board.  This  plan  was  accepted  and  referred  to  a 
Committee  of  the  Whole  for  consideration,  but  was  too  trenchant 
for  immediate  application,  and  required  modification  in  some  impor- 
tant particulars.  It  was  very  fully  discussed  during  the  whole  of  the 
evening  of  February  26.  On  February  28,  the  Committee  of  the 
Whole  again  took  up  the  matter  referred  to  it,  and  after  proceeding 
to  Item  14,  rose  and  reported  progress. 

"  The  board  at  this  meeting  of  February  28,  1877,  adopted  a  reso- 
lution to  reduce  the  salaries  of  teachers  and  other  employees  of  the 
board  (excepting  city  superintendent  and  assistants),  3^  per  cent, 
for  the  month  of  March,  1877,  said  sum  to  be  restored  to  teachers 
and  employees  on  the  pay-rolls  of  the  month  of  December,  1877, 
if  such  action  should  then  be  justified  by  the  financial  condition  of 
the  board. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  463 

"On  March  7  the  Committee  on  the  Whole,  in  reference  to  the 
report  of  the  Committee  on  Salaries  and  Economy,  reported  progress 
and  asked  leave  to  sit  again,  which  report  was  accepted,  and  leave 
granted. 

"  On  July  5,  1877,  it  was  resolved  on  motion  of  Commissioner 
Dowd  that  the  Committee  of  the  Whole  be  discharged  from  the 
further  consideration  of  the  report  of  the  Committee  on  Salaries  and 
Economy,  in  reference  to  meeting  the  financial  difificulty  occasioned 
by  the  cutting  down  of  our  budget,  and  that  the  report  be  re-com- 
mitted to  the  Committee  on  Salaries  and  Economy,  and  there  that 
matter  has  rested  ever  since — the  only  practical  result  being  that 
teachers  and  employees  of  the  board,  other  than  the  city  superin- 
tendent and  assistants,  have  had  3^  per  cent,  deducted  from  their 
salaries  for  nine  months  of  the  year  1877,  no  return  being  made  in 
December,  1877,  for  any  portion  of  the  sums  so  deducted. 

"  During  the  spring  an  application  was  made  to  the  Legislature 
for  the  passage  of  a  new  law  to  restore  the  Board  of  Education  to 
somewhat  of  its  former  position  of  independence,  permitting  a  vote 
of  three-fourths  of  its  members  to  override  any  objection  or  rectifica- 
tion of  the  Board  of  Alderman.  This  three-fourths  was  in  a  private 
meeting  of  the  board  afterward  raised  to  eighteen-twenty-firsts,  and 
sent  up  to  the  legislature,  where  the  latter  fraction  was  reduced  to 
twelve-twenty-firsts,  and  so  passed  both  houses  of  the  legislature 
but  was  vetoed  by  the  Governor. 

"  The  only  radical  change  which  has  taken  place  in  tlie  arrange- 
ments for  the  management  of  the  schools,  is  the  abolition,  for  the 
future,  of  vice-principals  in  all  the  departments.  This  was  adopted 
as  a  by-law  of  the  board  on  November  7,  1877. 

"  Having  given  in  my  address  of  December  26  a  synopsis  of  the 
condition  of  our  schools  and  colleges,  I  do  not  now  refer  again  to 
the  subject. 

"  At  the  special  meeting  of  the  board,  on  December  31,  we  were 
put  in  possession  of  the  final  decision  of  the  Board  of  Estimate  and 
Apportionment,  with  regard  to  the  amount  of  funds  put  at  our  dis- 
posal, for  carrying  on  the  Department  of  Education  of  this  city  for 
the  year  1878;  to  do  this  efficiently  (which  is  really  true  economy), 
we  asked  for  33,949, 800,  and  were  granted  $3, 400, 000,  being  a 
reduction  of  $549,800. 


464  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  On  Wednesday,  December  19,  I  was  appointed,  with  Messrs. 
Dowd,  Halsted,  Walker,  Wickham,  Beardslee,  and  West,  to  go  before 
the  Board  of  Estimate  and  Apportionment  and  answer  such  ques- 
tions as  might  be  put  to  us  respecting  our  budget  for  1878.  I  was 
under  examination  for  an  hour  and  a  half  ;  among  the  many  ques- 
tions propounded  was  '  Whether  I  thought  it  possible  to  reduce  our 
estimate  for  the  expenses  of  the  schools  in  1878,  without  diminish- 
ing their  efificiency?  '  To  this  I  replied  that  before  giving  a  direct 
answer,  I  would  mention  a  historical  incident.  In  1682  Charles  I. 
entered  the  Long  Parliament,  then  sitting,  and  marching  up  to  the 
Speaker's  chair  took  possession  of  it,  and  desired  Speaker  Lenthal 
to  point  out  to  him  the  five  members — Hampden,  Pym,  Hazelrig, 
Holies,  and  Strode — whom  he  wished  to  arrest  for  high  treason. 
Whereupon  Lenthal,  falling  on  his  knees,  said:  '  I  have  neither  eyes 
to  see,  nor  tongue  to  speak,  in  this  place,  but  as  the  House,  whose 
servant  I  am,  is  pleased  to  direct  me.'  Now,  the  Board  of  Educa- 
tion, whose  president  I  am,  has  held  two  public  meetings,  where, 
after  much  discussion  in  addition  to  all  the  previous  discussions  in  the 
various  standing  committees  of  the  board,  it  arrived  at  the  conclu- 
sion, which  was  duly  reported  to  you,  that  it  required  $3,949,800  to 
carry  on  the  work  of  the  common  schools  efficiently^  and  it  would  be  a 
piece  of  impertinence  in  me  to  offer  any  alteration  or  amendment 
of  that  conclusion,  which  indeed  I  cordially  assented  to.  We  were 
repeatedly  assured  by  members  of  the  Board  of  Estimate  and  Ap- 
portionment that  they  were  friends  and  not  enemies  of  the  common 
schools,  and  that  their  asking  if  the  expenses  could  be  reduced  in 
any  way,  without  impairing  their  efificiency,  was  in  love,  and  not 
from  dislike.  When  the  professions  of  the  19th  are  compared  with 
i\iQ practice  of  the  31st  of  December,  one  is  forcibly  reminded  of 
the  words  of  the  old  song: 

"  '  Perhaps  it  was  right  to  dissemble  your  love, 
But  why  did  you  kick  me  downstairs?' 

"  Still  it  is  satisfactory  to  learn  from  Mayor  Ely's  message  that  he 
is  not  in  favor  of  reducing  the  salaries  of  existing  teachers. 

"  It  is  curious  to  trace  the  bit-by-bit  attacks  upon  the  efificiency 
of  our  common  school  system,  for  I  believe  that  just  in  proportion 
to  the    reduction   of   our  various   budgets   is    the   reduction  of  the 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  465 

efficiency  of  our  schools,  looking  to  the  future  as  well  as  to  the 
present, 

"  In  1874,  the  last  year  of  the  old  city  limits  with  their  twenty-two 
wards,  the  sum  asked  for  by  the  board  was  $3,934,500,  and  there 
was  granted  $3,919,086  ;  reduction,  $15,414.  Andrew  H.  Green 
being  comptroller  and  Jacob  D.  Vermilye  chairman  of  our  Finance 
Committee,  and  the  average  attendance  for  1874,  96,249  day 
scholars. 

"For  1875,  the  first  year  of  the  new  city  with  its  twenty-four 
wards,  we  asked  for  $3,683,000,  and  got  $3,583,000  ;  reduction, 
$100,000.     Average  attendance  for  1875,  99,090  day  scholars. 

"  For  1876  we  asked  for  $3,796,500,  and  got  $3,653,000  ;  reduc- 
tion, $143,500.      Average  attendance  for  1876,  103,690  day  scholars. 

"  For  1877  we  asked  for  $3,888,352,  and  got  $3,553,000;  reduc- 
tion, $335,352.     Average  attendance  for  1877,  108,270  day  scholars. 

"  For  1878  we  asked  for  $3,949,800,  and  got  $3,400,000;  reduc- 
tion, $549,800. 

"  '  It  is  the  little  rift  within  the  lute, 

Which  by  and  by  willmake  the  music  mute, 
And,  ever  widening,  slowly  silence  all.' 

"  It  is  thus  shown  that  there  has  been  a  continuous  reduction  of 
our  budgets  since  1874,  when  we  were  allowed  $3,934,500  for  96,249 
scholars,  to  $3,400,000  for  108,270  scholars,  and  hundreds  more 
knocking  at  our  gates,  for  whom  we  have  no  room.  And  thus  it 
appears  that  while  the  attendance  of  scholars  has  been  constantly 
increasing,  the  power  of  this  board  to  provide  additional  accommoda- 
tion for  them  has  been  yearly  curtailed  by  the  reductions  made  in 
the  moneys  granted  for  school  purposes.  The  friends  of  common- 
school,  unsectarian  education,  under  these  circumstances,  may  well 
feel  alarmed  and  anxious,  especially  after  the  blast  which  Gover- 
nor Robinson  gave,  in  his  inaugural  message  of  January,  1877, 
against  the  Normal  Schools  of  the  State,  followed  up  by  his  anim- 
adversions upon  secondary  or  higher  education,  at  the  public  ex- 
pense, in  his  message  of  ist  inst. 

"  While  everyone  must  allow  that  primary  education  is  the  most 
important  of  all  the  branches,  and  that  no  enduring  superstructure 
of   higher  education    can  be    erected    without   a   thoroughly   good 


466  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

foundation  of  primary  instruction,  yet  in  a  republic  I  think  it  is  the 
part  of  wise  statemanship  to  give  the  people  that  secondary  or 
higher  education,  at  the  expense  of  the  state  or  municipality,  which 
they  themselves  demand. 

"  In  a  monarchy  the  giving  of  instruction  in  the  three  '  R's  '  may 
be  all  that  the  state  is  called  upon  to  see  that  its  subjects  shall 
have,  and  it  was  in  relation  to  education  in  England  that  Sir  Wm. 
Curtis,  Alderman  of  London,  and  a  boon  companion  of  George  IV., 
enunciated  his  celebrated  dictum  regarding  '  reading,  'riting,  and 
'rithmetic'  It  would  be  hopeless,  there,  to  bring  the  different 
classes  or  castes  of  society  into  the  common  schools,  and  for  the 
preservation  of  a  monarchy  with  all  its  different  ranks  it  is  perhaps 
not  desirable  that  the  '  middle  wall  of  partition  '  between  classes 
should  be  thrown  down,  but  in  a  republic  it  is  a  very  different  affair. 
Here  we  acknowledge  no  difference  of  rank,  and  there  is  nothing  to 
prevent  the  children  of  the  rich  and  the  poor,  the  children  of  the 
direct  and  i7idirect  taxpayers,  meeting  on  terms  of  perfect  equality 
in  the  arena  of  the  common  schools.  Is  should,  therefore,  be  our 
object  to  attract  the  children  of  the  direct  taxpayer,  the  children  of 
the  wealthier  classes,  to  our  common  schools,  and  this  can  only  be 
done  by  providing  them  not  only  with  a  thoroughly  good  primary 
education,  but  also  with  the  higher  branches  of  education,  as  is  in 
point  of  fact  done  in  our  grammar  schools  and  in  our  College  of  the 
City  of  New  York  for  young  men  and  in  our  Normal  College  for 
young  women.  It  is  a  great  mistake  to  suppose  that  with  thoroughly 
good  schools  and  efficient  colleges  the  direct  taxpayers  would  be 
unduly  burdened,  for  they  would,  in  the  case  supposed,  send  their 
children  to  the  common  schools  and  colleges,  and  thereby  save  the 
great  expense  of  private  tuition. 

"  Gentlemen,  in  order  to  put  an  end  to  jealousy  among  the  citi- 
zens of  foreign  birth  resident  among  us,  I  would  suggest  the  pro- 
priety of  considering  the  abolition  of  the  teaching  of  German  and 
French  in  the  three  upper  grades  of  our  grammar  schools,  and  the 
substitution  of  Latin.  The  graduates  of  the  Normal  College  and 
the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York  could  teach  all  the  Latin  that 
would  be  required  for  this  purpose  without  additional  cost.  When 
I  voted  in  1875  for  retaining  German  and  French  in  the  three  upper 
grades  of  the  grammar  schools  I  stated  that  I  would  prefer  Latin  to 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  467 

either  language,  and  that  I  looked  upon  the  teaching  of  the  two 
former  languages  merely  as  an  aid  to  the  better  knowledge  of  the 
English  language,  and  that  I  did  not  believe  that  all  the  instruction 
given  in  the  grammar  schools  would  make  either  good  German  or 
French  scholars.  Since  then  I  have  had  these  views  confirmed  by 
the  inquiries  I  have  made.  Neither  in  German  nor  in  French  are 
the  pupils  proficient  scholars,  and  with  regard  to  the  latter  language 
I  presume  it  may  be  said  of  the  pupils  in  it,  as  it  was  of  the  Prioress 
in  Chaucer's  '  Pilgrimage  to  Canterbury  '  : 

"  '  French  she  spoke  full  well  and  feateously, 
After  the  school  of  Stratford-atte-Bowe, 
But  French  of  Paris  was  to  her  unknowe,' 

and  probably  New  York  German  would  be  equally  '  unknowe  '  at 
Berlin  or  Vienna.  Latin  would  fit  both  boys  and  girls  for  entrance 
into  their  respective  colleges,  and  give  them  a  better  knowledge  of 
the  roots  of  their  own  language  than  either  German  or  French. 

"  Good  schools,  both  for  primary  and  secondary  instruction,  with 
the  two  colleges  kept  up  efficiently,  would,  with  rapid  transit,  help 
to  bring  back  to  the  city  that  great  middle  class  which,  during  the 
last  ten  years,  has  been  absolutely  squeezed  out  of  it,  leaving  here 
only  the  very  rich  and  the  very  poor,  and  it  is  upon  that  great 
middle  class,  more  than  upon  any  other,  that  the  safety  and  salva- 
tion of  the  Republic  depends. 

"  With  regard  to  the  primary  instruction  in  our  schools,  no  children 
should  leave  them  without,  as  John  Bright  says,  being  'able  to  read, 
and  to  comprehend  what  they  read,  and  to  write  in  such  a  way  that 
their  writing  can  be  read,  and  to  know  as  much  of  arithmetic  as  will 
enable  thein  to  keep  an  account  of  those  money  transactions  that 
they  may  happen  to  have  in  the  course  of  their  lives.'  While,  at  the 
same  time,  all  the  merit  and  talent  of  the  city  should,  by  a  thor- 
oughly good  education,  have  the  opportunity  of  rising  if  it  desires, 
and  is  worthy  of  rising,  and  so  be  a  blessing  to  this  city  and  to  our 
country. 

"  As  to  future  examinations  for  teachers,  I  would  suggest  that  in 
addition  to  those  subjects  upon  which  they  are  now  examined,  as 
set  forth  in  section  28,  sub-section  4,  page  121,  of  the  manual,  can- 
didates should  all  have   to   pass  an  examination  in  Latin  and  Ger- 


468  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

man  or  French,  which  would  give  our  Normal  College  graduates  a 
better  chance  of  obtaining  positions  as  teachers  than  they  have  at 
present. 

"  I  have  to  reiterate  what  I  said  last  year,  that  this  board  should 
at  least  have  a  veto  on  the  appointment  and  transfer  of  all  teachers, 
with  the  absolute  appointment  of  principals.  We  are  held  respon- 
sible for  the  efficient  working  of  our  whole  school  system,  and  yet 
have  not  at  present  the  appointment  of  a  single  teacher. 

"  We  should  likewise  have  the  power  to  transfer  teachers  from 
ward  to  ward,  and  from  school  to  school,  should  circumstances, 
which  are  continually  occurring  and  are  familiar  to  all  of  us,  render 
such  transfer  necessary. 

"While  we  are  so  short  of  funds,  and  therefore  can  do  nothing 
toward  the  adoption  of  any  of  the  new  systems  of  ventilation  for  the 
schools,  it  struck  me  that  a  strict  adherence  to  the  following  com- 
mon-sense rule  would  be  highly  beneficial,  and  cost  nothing  but 
careful  attention  on  the  part  of  the  class  teachers.  I  take  it  from 
the  'Annual  Report  for  1876-77  of  the  Board  of  Education  of  the 
City  of  Lawrence,  Kan.'  : 

"  '  Ventilation. — Teachers  are  required,  for  the  preservation  of 
the  health  of  themselves  and  pupils,  to  give  particular  attention  to 
the  ventilating  and  warming  of  their  rooms,  and  always  to  ventilate, 
except  in  summer,  by  lowering  the  upper  sash  of  the  windows,  and 
on  no  account  to  suffer  the  children  to  sit  in  draughts  of  cold  air  ; 
and,. as  a  general  rule,  to  cause  all  the  windows  to  be  opened  for  the 
free  admission  of  air  at  recess,  and  at  no  time  to  raise  the  tempera- 
ture of  the  room  higher  than  70*  Fahrenheit.' 

"  Another  matter  worthy  of  the  attention  of  the  board  is  the  cus- 
tom prevailing  in  some  of  the  lower  wards  and  the  two  upper  wards 
of  the  city,  and  also  In  some  others,  of  appointing  teachers  educated 
in  the  school  to  which  they  are  appointed,  unless,  indeed,  they  have 
in  the  interval  graduated  at  the  Normal  College,  and  even  that  ex- 
ception is  of  doubtful  propriety. 

"  '  Home-keeping  youths  have  ever  homely  wits,' 

and  it  is  belter  that  young  teachers  should  be  taken  entirely  out  of 
the  old  ruts  to  which  they  have  been  accustomed. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE,  469 

"  In  conclusion,  I  would  say  that  perhaps  our  schools,  or  at  least 
the  good  ones,  are  too  much  inspected.  A  very  cursory  inspection  of 
a  school  of  long  standing  for  excellent  scholarship  and  discipline 
ought  to  satisfy  the  city  superintendent,  while  on  the  other  hand, 
'good,  indifferent,  or  bad  '  schools  ought  to  be  visited  and  revisited 
either  until  they  are  brought  up  to  the  mark  or  their  teachers  re- 
ported to  this  board  as  incompetent. 

"  On  and  after  Monday,  January  14,  I  shall,  as  heretofore,  attend 
at  the  president's  office  daily,  from  2  till  4  p.  m.,  for  the  pur- 
pose of  receiving  visitors  who  may  desire  to  converse  with  me  in 
reference  to  anything  connected  with  the  cause  of  education,  offici- 
ally or  otherwise.  These  two  hours,  between  2  and  4  p.  m.,  on 
Saturdays  will  be  reserved  exclusively  for  the  reception  of  teachers 
who  may  wish  to  see  me  regarding  any  matter  connected  with  their 
profession." 

Father  was  elected  chairman  of  the  Board  of  Trustees  of  the 
College  of  the  City  of  New  York  in  1878  for  the  third  time,  receiv- 
ing thirteen  of  the  fifteen  votes  cast.  In  his  address  on  the  occa- 
sion he  explained  away  a  misconstruction  that  had  been  put  upon 
a  quotation  he  had  made  from  Thomas  Carlyle  in  his  address  the 
preceding  year,  and  said  :  "  My  meaning  was  that  what  was  to  be 
done  in  the  way  of  reform  within  the  college  sliould  originate  in  the 
executive  committee  to  which  it  is  assigned,  and  which  committee, 
under  the  directions  and  by-laws  of  the  board,  has  '  the  special 
care,  government,  and  management  of  the  college  ';  and  the  less 
that  was  said  in  public  regarding  pending  reforms,  until  they 
were  completed,  the  belter." 

During  1877  the  executive  committee  of  the  college  took  up,  with 
zeal  and  ability,  the  question  of  various  reforms  in  the  management 
of  and  course  of  studies  in  the  college,  and  held  no  less  than 
twenty-two  meetings  during  the  year,  many  of  them  protracted  till 
midnight  ;  while  the  meetings  of  the  Board  of  Trustees  amounted  to 
twelve  in  the  course  of   1877,  instead  of  the  statutory  number  of  six. 

The  year  1878  was  marked  in  the  family  history  by  the  marriage 
of  my  brother  Duncan  to  Ellen  E.  Pulsifer,  daughter  of  William 
H.  Pulsifer  of  St.  Louis.  They  were  married  in  that  city  on  April 
24,  by  Rev.  J.  C.  Learned. 


470  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

On  being  elected,  by  sixteen  out  of  the  nineteen  votes  cast,  pres- 
ident of  the  Board  of  Education  for  the  fourth  time,  January  8, 
1879,  my  father  made  no  lengthy  address,  merely  referring  to  his 
valedictory  of  the  preceding  year  as  covering  all  the  points  he  would 
wish  to  touch  upon  regarding  the  common  schools.  He  added 
that,  as  heretofore,  he  would  be  in  the  president's  room  daily  for 
two  hours  to  see  visitors,  or  teachers  on  Saturdays,  on  business 
connected  with  the  cause  of  education. 

President  Wood's  term  of  office  as  commissioner  ended  in  1879, 
and  Mayor  Cooper  failed  to  reappoint  him.  He  was  succeeded,  I 
think,  by  Charles  J.  Nehrbas.  On  Mr.  Wood's  retiring  from  the 
board  Commissioner  Donnelly  offered  the  following  : 

"  Resolved,  That  in  view  of  the  early  retirement  of  William 
Wood,  LL.  D.,  from  the  board,  and  from  the  office  of  its  president, 
which  he  has  held  for  four  years  continuously,  this  board  do  place 
upon  record  its  estimation  of  his  services. 

''''Resolved^  That  his  unwearying  devotion  to  the  duties  of  his 
office  of  president,  in  all  their  breadth  and  detail,  has  earned  the 
confidence  and  commanded  the  respect  of  this  board. 

"  Resolved,  That  in  bringing  into  the  interests  of  the  schools  his 
extensive  knowledge  of  educational  subjects,  and  his  scholarly 
tastes,  united  to  an  active  energy,  so  much  the  more  admirable  in 
view  of  his  advanced  years,  and  to  a  ripeness  and  justness  of  judg- 
ment, in  part  their  consequence,  he  has  contributed  largely  to  the 
successful  results  of  the  schools,  and  to  the  public  confidence  they 
so  justly  enjoy. 

''''Resolved,  That  the  Normal  College  of  the  City  of  New  York 
is  especially  indebted  to  him  for  his  unwavering  support  and  the 
constant  watchfulness  he  has  exercised  in  its  behalf,  and  that  the 
important  influence  this  institution  is  exerting  and  is  likely  to  exert 
on  the  educational  system  of  the  city  is  largely  owing  to  his  interest 
and  efforts. 

"  Resolved,  That  this  board  parts  regretfully  with  its  president." 

The  acting  clerk  put  the  question  whether  the  board  would  adopt 
the  resolutions  offered  by  Commissioner  Donnelly,  and  it  was 
decided  in  the  affirmative. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  47 1 

The  president  addressed  the  board  as  follows  : 

"Gentlemen:  At  this  particular  juncture  the  remarkable  and 
appreciative  kindliness  of  the  handsome,  but  too  flattering,  resolu- 
tions, in  reference  to  my  services,  which  have  just  been  adopted  by 
the  board,  is  especially  grateful  to  me  ;  and  what  adds  to  my 
pleasure  is  that  they  should  have  been  offered  by  a  friend  holding 
different  religious  views  from  myself,  thus  proving  that,  however 
various  the  creeds  of  the  members  of  this  board,  we  can  all  meet 
and  act  harmoniously  on  the  broad  ground  of  the  effective  pro- 
motion of  common  school  education. 

"  *  Parthians  and  Medes  and  Elarnites,'  and  all  the  dwellers  in 
our  Mesopotamian  city,  can  through  our  common  schools  receive 
a  thorough  and  unsectarian  education,  while  at  the  same  time  we 
can  boast,  what  even  London  itself  cannot  do  with  its  State 
Church,  its  bishops  and  its  deans  and  its  prebendaries — that  every 
school-day  morning  at  nine  o'clock  more  than  one  hundred  thousand 
children  are  having  the  Bible  read  to  them,  and  the  small  seed  thus 
sown  may,  under  the  fostering  care  of  the  great  Husbandman,  bring 
forth  everlasting  fruit. 

"  Gentlemen,  during  1879,  including  the  present,  we  have  held  29 
public  meetings,  and  there  have  been  10  public  meetings  of  the 
Board  of  Trustees  of  the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York  ;  39 
public  meetings  in  all,  over  all  of  which  I  have  presided. 

"I  have  also,  ex  officio,  attended  184  committee  meetings  of  this 
board,  and  13  of  the  executive  committee  of  the  College  of  the  City 
of  New  York,  or  197  committee  meetings  in  all.  The  total  number 
of  committee  meetings  of  this  board  in  1879  has  been  263,  involving 
an  amount  of  work,  regarding  which  the  outside  public  have  very 
little  idea.  The  minutes  of  our  public  meetings  alone,  up  to  and 
inclusive  of  that  of  23d  inst.,  fill  1080  pages,  and  will  exceed  iioo 
pages  when  the  minutes  of  this  meeting  are  recorded. 

"  The  average  attendance  at  our  common  schools  for  the  month 
ending  November  30,  1879,  was  115.548  scholars,  exceeding  tliat  of 
the  month  of  November,  1878,  by  3539,  and  in  addition  to  this 
increase,  I  regret  to  say,  that  in  November,  1879,  not  less  than  105 1 
pupils  were  refused  admittance  for  want  of  room. 

"  In  October,  1869,  the  year  in  which  I  first  became  school  com- 


472  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

missioner,  the  attendance  in  our  common  schools  was  80,000  ;  in 
November  last,  115,548;  therefore  in  round  numbers  there  is  an 
increase  of  30,000  pupils  in  ten  years,  which  is  at  the  rate  of  3000 
per  annum.  Now,  during  1879  the  additional  school  accommodation 
provided  consists  of  28  rooms,  capable  of  containing  1400  pupils,  or 
less  than  one-half  of  the  annual  increment  of  scholars.  It  is  no  fault 
of  the  board  that  such  a  state  of  things  exists.  We  are  from  two  to 
three  years  behind  in  school  accommodations  for  the  prospective 
annual  increase  of  scholars.  We  have  not  failed  to  cry  mightily 
every  year  to  the  Board  of  Estimate  and  Apportionment  for  more 
money  to  acquire  sites  and  to  build  schools.  To  go  no  further  back 
than  the  Centennial  year  : 

"In  1876  we  got  for  1877  S335>352  less  than  we  asked  for;  in 
1877  we  got  for  1878  $549,800  less  than  we  asked  for  ;  in  1878  we 
got  for  1879  $184,000  less  than  we  asked  for;  in  1879  we  got  for 
1880  $58,200  less  than  we  asked  for  ;  and  already  building  sites 
and  materials  are  at  least  from  twenty  to  thirty  per  cent,  higher  than 
they  were  during  the  previous  three  years  of  depressed  business  and 
low  prices. 

"  The  Normal  College  session,  which  began  September  i,  1879, 
gives  so  far  the  follow  results  : 

"  The  largest  number  on  register  was  on  Friday,  September  5, 
1698  ;  the  largest  number  in  attendance  on  Wednesday,  September 
24,  1463  ;  the  registered  number  on  Tuesday,  December  16,  was 
1437  ;  and  the  number  in  attendance  same  day  was  1382. 

"  In  the  training  department  of  the  Normal  College  the  largest 
number  on  register  in  September  was  1056  ;  and  the  largest  number 
in  attendance  in  September  was  970.  On  December  18  the  registered 
number  of  pupils  was  1000  ;  and  the  number  in  attendance,  883. 

"  I  leave  the  Normal  College  and  training  department  in  the  most 
satisfactory  and  prosperous  condition,  and  I  am  confident  that  the 
addition  of  a  fourth  year  to  the  Normal  College  course  will  most 
materially  add  to  the  efificiency  of  the  future  teachers  of  our  common 
schools,  and  so  to  the  proficiency  of  their  scholars. 

"In  June,  1881,  a  class  of  the  first  grammar  grade  will  graduate 
from  the  training  department,  and  will  be  qualified  for  entrance  to 
the  Normal  College,  which  will  afford  practical  proof  of  the  truth 
of  what  I  advocated  in  my  valedictory  address  to  this  board  Decem- 


CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  473 

ber  20,  1876,  that  all  the  fourteen  grades  of  the  primary  and  grammar 
courses  can  be  taught  under  the  supervision  of  one  superintendent 
or  principal,  and  thus  a  large  amount  at  present  paid  for  supervision 
can  be  saved  to  the  city. 

"  It  appears  to  me  that  it  would  be  only  fair  to  the  graduates  of  the 
Normal  College,  and  only  fair  to  the  ])upil3  of  our  common  schools, 
that  all  female  candidates  for  teachers'  licenses  should  pass  through 
the  same  ordeal  of  examination  as  the  Normal  College  graduates. 

"In  1879,  there  have  been  ;^^  young  women  who  failed  to 
graduate  at  the  Normal  College,  and  who  have  applied  to  the  city 
superintendent  for  licenses  to  teach.  Of  these  t,2>i  21  have 
managed  to  squeeze  through,  and  have  received  licenses,  although 
they  failed  to  pass  the  Normal  College  examination.  This  is 
most  zinfair  and  discouraging  to  the  hard-working  and  efficient 
graduates  of  that  institution,  and  if  State  legislation  cannot  be  had 
to  rectify  tlie  existing  condition  of  matters,  then  certainly  our 
by-laws  should  be  so  modified  as  to  make  all  female  candidates  for 
teachers'  licenses  pass  through  exactly  the  same  examination  as  the 
Normal  College  graduates. 

"Besides  Normal  College  students,  22  female  teachers  have  been 
licensed  by  the  city  superintendent.  On  June  26  last,  288  young 
ladies  graduated  at  the  Normal  College,  and  in  September  the  number 
was  made  up  to  300.  These  have  received,  or  will  receive,  licenses 
to  teach,  when  they  are  eighteen  years  of  age,  as  required  by  the 
by-laws.  Outside  of  the  Normal  College  graduates,  as  I  have  stated, 
43  female  candidates  have  received  licenses  to  teach  from  the  city 
superintendent,  or  about  12^  per  cent,  of  the  whole  number 
licensed  were  not  Normal  College  ^/77<///^/,?j-.  As  the  licensing  of 
the  graduates  is  a  mere  form,  their  diplomas  virtually  securing  their 
licenses,  why  should  not  the  licensing  of  all  female  teachers  be  trans- 
ferred by  new  legislation  to  the  faculty  of  the  Normal  College  ? 
When  we  had  neither  of  the  colleges,  the  city  superintendent  was 
perhaps  the  proper  official  to  license  teachers  ;  but  I  think  that  the 
power  would  now  be  far  more  appropriately  lodged  with  the  faculty 
of  the  Normal  College  for  female  candidates,  and  with  the  faculty 
of  the  College  of  the  City  of  New  York  for  male  candidates. 

"The  Evening  High  School,  which  affords  such  admirable  oppor- 
tunities for  young  men  engaged  in  business  pursuits  to  perfect  their 


474  AUTOBIOCRAPHV    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

education,  continues  as  heretofore  in  a  state  of  tliorough  efficiency. 
It  reopened  on  Monday,  October  6,  1879,  with  a  registered  number 
of  1776  scholars  and  with  an  actual  attendance  of  1510. 

"The  average  attendance  during  October  was  1590  ;  the  average 
attendance  during  November  was  1330  ;  the  average  attendance 
from  December  i  to  19,  was  1164  :  the  average  from  October  6  till 
December  19  was  1382  ;  same  period  1878,  1377. 

"  In  the  Department  of  Truancy,  the  total  number  of  warrants 
issued  in  1879  for  the  arrest  of  truants  was  67  ;  of  these  17  have 
been  issued  since  September  i.  All  arrested  previous  to  that  date 
I  discharged,  on  or  prior  to  August  29,  1879,  and,  yesterday  I  dis- 
charged the  last  of  those  arrested  since  September  i,  so  as  to 
leave  my  successor  a  clear  stage,  without  remanents. 

"  To  make  the  truancy  law  effective  it  requires  several  amend- 
ments, which  have  suggested  themselves  to  me  during  the  four  years 
in  which  its  administration  has  been  in  my  hands. 

"  It  is  a  great  evil  to  have  to  take  truants  to  be  committed  to  a 
place  of  detention  before  a  police  magistrate,  thus  bringing  them  in 
contact  with  the  criminal  classes.  The  president  of  this  board,  or 
in  his  absence,  the  chairman  of  the  Committee  on  By-Taws,  ought  to 
be  made  a  magistrate,  with  the  power  to  commit  truants,  if  such 
special  power  can  be  granted  by  the  Legislature. 

"  Then  the  New  York  Juvenile  Asylum  ought  to  be  obliged  by 
law  to  take  our  truants,  subject  to  our  control  as  to  the  time  of  their 
discharge.  At  present  the  Catholic  Protectory  is  the  only  institution 
which  receives  our  truants,  whether  Catholic  or  Protestant,  sub- 
ject to  the  order  of  this  board  for  their  release. 

"  The  Society  for  the  Reformation  of  Juvenile  Delinquents  has  no 
room  in  open  dormitories  on  Ward's  Island,  and  I  am  utterly  opposed 
to  having  them  locked  up  nightly  in  cells,  like  felons. 

"  Of  course,  a  reformatory  institution  of  our  own,  either  on 
Randall's  or  Ward's  Island,  or  on  board  a  ship  moored  in  the  bay, 
would  be  better  than  any  of  the  existing  institutions  ;  but  if  the 
necessary  funds  cannot  be  provided  by  the  city,  then  let  us  at  least 
obtain  power  from  the  Legislature  to  commit  Protestant  truants  to 
the  Juvenile  Asylum  upon  our  own  conditions.  It  is,  I  think,  an 
admirably  managed  institution. 

"The  Nautical  School  during  1879,  up  to  December  19,  has  had 


CONTINUATION   BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  475 

an  average  of  122  scholars,  while  the  total  number  taught  during 
1879  was  175  ;  and,  although  the  board  very  well  knows  that  I  am 
opposed  to  having  the  cost  of  the  Nautical  School  defrayed  from 
the  funds  properly  belonging  to  our  common  schools,  yet  I  cannot 
refrain  in  this,  my  last,  address  to  this  board  from  expressing  my 
admiration  of  the  manner  in  which  the  affairs  of  the  Nautical 
School  have  been  administered  ever  since  its  inception  by  Commis- 
sioner David  Wetmore,  chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Nautical 
School,  and  his  various  coadjutors  on  that  committee  ;  and  we  have 
been  exceedingly  fortunate  in  obtaining  the  services  of  Commander 
Henry  Erben,  U.  S.  N.,  as  superintendent,  in  place  of  his  able  pre- 
decessor. Commander  R.  L.  Phytian,  U.  S.  N. 

"  Gentlemen,  during  1879  much  more  than  ordinary  attention  has 
been  bestowed  on  their  respective  departments  by  the  committees 
on  Buildings  and  on  Warming  and  Ventilation,  and  very  great  good 
will  inevitably  result  from  the  painstaking  and  intelligent  investiga- 
tions of  the  respective  chairmen  of  these  important  committees, 
Messrs.  Watson  and  Donnelly. 

"  Before  my  departure,  I  think  I  ought  to  express  my  opinion 
regarding  the  working  of  the  present  educational  system  in  refer- 
ence to  the  highly  important  office  of  trustee  of  our  common 
schools.  The  creature  ought  not  to  be  more  powerful  than  the 
creator.  The  trustees'  term  of  service  should  not  be  five  years, 
while  ours  is  only  three.  We  all  know  the  tendency  which  exists  in 
most  of  the  wards  for  the  trustees  to  form  themselves  into  rings  of 
three  and  two.  The  larger  ring  has  practically  the  entire  power, 
and  does  all  the  work  of  appointing  the  teachers.  Why,  then? 
should  not  the  number  of  trustees  in  each  ward  be  reduced  to  three 
and  the  term  of  office  to  two  years  ?  Two  trustees  going  out  of 
office  one  year,  and  one  trustee  the  next  year,  and  so  on  alternately. 
This  would  put  it  in  the  power  of  this  board  effectually  to  break  up 
the  rings  I  refer  to. 

"  The  Board  of  Education  should  also,  by  fresh  legislation, 
obtain  the  power  of  confirming  or  rejecting  all  nominations  or 
transfers  of  teachers  in  the  day  schools,  as  they  now  have  in  the 
evening  schools,  and  in  case  the  trustees  do  not,  within  ten  days 
from  the  occurrence  of  a  vacancy,  nominate  a  suitable  person  to  fill 
it,  then  the  appointment  ought  to  vest  in  this  board. 


4/6  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  Gentlemen,  on  the  whole,  our  work  in  1879  has  flowed  on  more 
equably  and  quietly  than  in  any  of  the  three  previous  years,  the 
only  causes  of  excitement  being  the  extraordinary  and  unexpected 
Kiddle  episode,  brought  first  formally  to  the  notice  of  the  board  at 
its  meeting  on  May  21  by  the  tendered  resignation  of  City  Super- 
intendent Kiddle,  to  take  effect  on  September  i,  or  as  soon  there- 
after as  his  successor  was  appointed.  That  successor  was  appointed 
on  October  i,  1879,  in  the  person  of  John  Jasper,  Jr.,  Esq.,  pre- 
viously one  of  the  assistant  superintendents  ;  and,  judging  from  his 
former  record  and  from  the  reports  he  has  made  to  the  board  since 
his  election,  I  augur  a  brilliant  future  for  him  in  the  department 
over  which  he  presides.  And  we  have  also  been  most  fortunate  in 
securing  on  November  12  the  services  of  James  Godwin,  Esq.,  as 
assistant  superintendent,  to  fill  the  vacancy  caused  by  Mr.  Jasper's 
promotion. 

"  I  have  attended  all  the  meetings,  except  one,  of  the  city 
superintendent  and  his  assistants,  held  on  the  last  Saturday 
of  every  month  (excepting  July  and  August),  under  the 
by-law  of  November  27,  1878,  and  I  am  of  opinion  that  these 
meetings  are  calculated  to  do  great  good  to  our  system  of  common 
school  instruction,  by  affording  opportunities  for  the  city  superin- 
tendent and  his  assistants,  together  with  the  president  of  the  board? 
to  discuss  all  the  subjects  constantly  arising  in  reference  to  the 
efificient  administration  of  the  by-laws  of  this  board  throughout 
our  city  schools. 

"The  other  exciting  episode  of  the  year  occurred  on  November 
19,  when  his  Honor  the  Mayor  appointed  five  new  coaimissioners  of 
public  schools,  in  place  of  five  old  ones  whose  terms  of  office  expire 
to-morrow.  Such  a  sweeping  change  has  been  hitherto  quite 
unprecedented. 

"  For  myself,  I  am  by  no  means  disposed  to  whine  over  my  sev- 
erance from  the  duties  I  have  loved  so  well,  knowing  as  I  do,  that 
had  my  reappointment  rested  with  my  colleagues  in  this  board,  who 
best  knokv  my  services  to  the  cause  of  common  school  education, 
and  to  the  higher  education  of  women,  I  should  have  been  reap- 
pointed by  a  large  majority,  and  probably  re-elected  president  in 
1880,  in  spite  of  any  protests  I  have  made  to  the  contrary. 

"Gentlemen,  I  retire  from  the  Board  of  Education   with  a  proud 


CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.    KANE.  477 

consciousness  of  having  done  niy  duty  to  the  taxpayers  of  the  city 
of  New  York,  and  to  their  children  in  the  common  schools,  during 
the  long  period  in  which  I  have  held  ofifice  as  school  commissioner. 

"  My  first  commission  bears  the  date  of  May  4,  1869.  My  sec- 
ond, as  '  Commissioner  of  the  Department  of  Public  Instruction,' 
is  dated  April  22,  187 1.  These  two  commissions  were  both  issued 
to  me  by  Mayor  A.  Oakey  Hall.  My  third  commission  is  dated 
April  28,  1875,  when  I  was  appointed  to  succeed  my  successor  of 
1873,  the  late  James  W.  Farr,  Esq.;  and  my  fourth  and  last  appoint- 
ment was  made  on  November  15,  187^.  These  two  last  commis- 
sions were  issued  by  our  present  associate  commissioner,  Mayor 
Wickham.  During  these  various  terms  I  have  been  absent  only 
once  in  March,  1871,  and  twice  in  December,  1876,  the  latter  from 
severe  illness. 

"I  feel  thankful  to  God  that  I  have  been  permitted  to  devote  the 
eighth  part  of  a  long  life  to  the  educational  interests  of  our  great 
city  ;  but  although  I  regard  the  office  of  president  of  the  Board  of 
Education  of  the  City  of  New  York  as  the  most  important  ofifice  in 
the  municipality,  I  descend  from  it  into  the  calm  sequestered  vale 
of    private    life   with    perfect    equanimity,    believing   with    Robert 

Burns  that 

"  '  The  rank  is  but  the  guinea's  stamp, 
The  man's  the  gowd  for  a'  that.' 

"Although  to-morrow  the  cause  of  common  school  education 
will  be  deprived  of  the  services  of  my  experienced  colleagues,  as 
well  as  of  my  own,  I  have  no  fear  that  our  absence  will  do  any  per- 
manent injury  to  the  system  of  common  school  education  ;  that  is 
a  perennial  fountain,  fertilizing  and  beautifying  the  waste  places  of 
our  city,  and  causing  our  moral  deserts  to  '  rejoice  and  blossom  as 
the  rose.'     Like  Tennyson's  '  Brook,' 

"  '  Men  may  come  and  men  may  go, 
But  it  flows  on  forever.' 

"  Of  course,  in  parting  from  you  all  I  shall  deeply  feel  the  want 
of  the  pleasant  excitement  of  our  fortnightly  public  meetings,  and 
even  more  the  less  formal,  but  most  interesting,  discussions  in  our 
numerous  committees,  but  I  shall   cheer  myself  with  the  hope  that 

Avhen  I  am  absent 

"  '  Some  kind  voice  may  murmur, 
I  wish  he  were  here.' 


478  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  And,  gentlemen,  I  am  not  without  some  slight  hope,  that  in  two 
years  hence  I  may  be  a  commissioner  designate  of  common  schools, 
and  if  I  feel  then  as  well  and  fit  to  work  as  I  do  now,  I  shall  cer- 
tainly accept  my  nomination. 

"  I  well  know  how  presumptuous  it  is  for  a  man  who  has  entered 
upon  his  seventy-second  year  to  look  forward  so  far,  but  I  can  say 
with  old  Adam,  in  '  As  You  Like  It,' 

"  '  Though  I  look  old,  yet  am  I  strong  and  lusty  ; 
For  in  my  youth  I  never  did  apply 
Hot  and  rebellious  liquors  in  my  blood  ; 
Nor  did  not  with  unbashful  forehead  woo 
The  means  of  weakness  and  debility  ; 
Therefore  my  age  is  as  a  lusty  winter, 
Frosty,  but  kindly.' 

"But  if  the  idea  of  a  return  to  this  board  be  but  a  vain  and  fond 
delusion  ;  if  the  place  which  has  known  me  so  long  shall  henceforth 
know  me  no  more  forever  ;  if  this  be  indeed  the  final  severance 
from  the  work  which  I  esteem  as  the  most  important  of  my  life, 
then  gentlemen,  even  then, 

"  '  Let  fate  do  her  worst,  there  are  relics  of  joy — 

Bright  dreams  of  the  past,  which  she  cannot  destroy  ; 
Which  come  in  the  night-time  of  sorrow  and  care, 
And  bring  back  the  features  that  joy  used  to  wear. 
Long,  long  be  my  heart  with  such  memories  filled, 
Like  the  vase  in  which  roses  have  once  been  distill'd. 
You  may  break,  you  may  shatter  the  vase,  if  you  will, 
But  the  scent  of  the  roses  will  hang  round  it  still.' 

"Gentlemen,  farewell!  and  may  God  bless  the  board  of  1880  in 
all  its  wise  efforts  to  promote  popular  education." 

"The  Kiddle  episode,"  to  which  father  refers,  only  appears  in  the 
minutes  of  the  board  in  the  shape  of  a  formal  tender  of  and  ac- 
ceptance of  resignation,  and  a  set  of  complimentary  resolutions, 
from  which  it  appears  that  Mr.  Kiddle  had  been  engaged  either  as 
teacher  or  superintendent  for  more  than  forty  years  in  the  service 
of  the  city.  Some  mention  of  this  long  and  meritorious  service 
would  seem  to  have  been  liis  due  from  the  retiring  president,  but 
from  the  time  of  my  father's  first  address  as  president  of  the  board, 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D,    KANE.  479 

in  1876,  I  think  tliere  had  been  friction  between  them.  My  father, 
for  one  thing,  held  that  the  pupils  of  the  Evening  High  School 
should  not  be  examined  by  the  city  superintendent,  and  supported 
Mr.  Babcock,  the  principal  of  the  Evening  High  School,  in  his  con- 
troversy with  Mr.  Kiddle  on  the  subject.  As  Mr.  Kiddle  was  defeated 
in  his  attempt  to  examine  the  Evening  High  School  scholars  he  did  not 
love  Mr.  Wood.  It  is  evident  from  the  president's  address  last  quoted 
that  Mr.  Kiddle  had  also  been  trenching  on  the  rights  and  privileges 
of  that  Normal  College,  so  dear  to  my  father's  heart.  However,  in 
these  last  days  of  December,  1879,  they  were  both  gone  out  of 
office. 

"  '  As,  in  a  theater,  the  eyes  of  men, 

After  a  well-graced  actor  leaves  the  stage, 
Are  idly  bent  on  him  that  enters  next.' 

So  I  turned  over  the  pages  of  the  minutes  of  the  board  for  1880 
to  see  who  succeeded  my  father  as  president,  and  what  he  said 
And  if  father's  children  have  felt  less  interest  than  I  have  in  the 
detailed  addresses  in  which  he  recounted  the  board's  work  in  suc- 
cessive years,  I  hope  they  will  be  as  pleased  as  I  was  to  read  what 
Stephen  A.  Walker  says  in  his  short  address,  January  14,  1880  : 

"  Gentlemen  of  the  Board  of  Education  : 

"  I  sincerely  thank  you  for  tlie  honor  conferred  upon  me.  I  un- 
dertake the  responsibilities  of  this  office  with  considerable  misgiving. 
It  will  be  quite  impossible  for  me  to  bring  to  its  duties  the  ability 
and  industry  illustrated  in  its  administration  by  my  distinguished 
predecessor,  or  to  make,  as  he  did,  what  may  be  called  the  lesser 
duties  of  the  place  the  subject  of  daily  attention.  To  be  the  coun- 
selor of  the  superintendents,  the  trustees,  and  the  principals  ;  to  be 
the  confidential  adviser  of  several  thousand  teachers  ;  to  be  the 
champion  of  the  aggrieved  and  the  comforter  of  every  wounded 
spirit  throughout  the  entire  educational  circle  of  this  city — these, 
gentlemen,  are  duties  which,  you  are  aware,  I  cannot  discharge." 

"New  York,  December  24,  1879. 
"  The    following    preamble    and     resolutions    were    unanimously 
adopted  by  the  students  of  the  Normal  College  : 

"  Whereas,  We   have  learned  with    deep  regret   that    the    Hon. 


480  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD, 

William  Wood  is  about  to  retire  from  the  Board  of  Education, 
whose  president  he  has  been  for  four  consecutive  years,  and 

"Whereas,  As  president  of  the  Board  and  chairman  of  the  Normal 
College  Committee,  he  has  always  manifested  a  profound  and  abiding 
interest  not  only  in  the  common  schools  general]}-,  but  especially  in 
the  Normal  College,  whose  students  have  always  appreciated  his 
fostering  and  fatherly  care  for  their  welfare  and  happiness  ;  there- 
fore, 

^''Resolved,  That  the  thanks  of  the  students  of  the  Normal  Col- 
lege are  eminently  due  and  are  hereby  tendered  to  the  Hon.  Wil- 
liam Wood,  LL.  D.,  for  the  encouragement  Avhich  he  has  always 
given  them  and  for  the  scholarly  ability  which  he  has  always 
brought  to  bear  upon  the  discharge  of  his  duties  in  relation  to  the 
college  ; 

''''Resolved,  That  the  students  of  the  Normal  College  are  deeply 
grieved  at  the  severe  loss  which  they  will  sustain  ;  that  they  wish 
him  health  and  happiness  in  his  retirement,  and  that  they  hope  the 
day  is  not  far  distant  when  he  shall  be  restored  to  the  educational 
councils  of  the  city,  which  his  superior  education,  his  purity  of 
character,  and  his  intellectual   ability  have  so  higlily  adorned  ;  and, 

"Resolved,  That  a  copy  of  this  preamble  and  these  resolutions  be 
inserted  in  the  college  minute  book  ;  that  they  be  properly  en- 
grossed, framed,  and  presented  to  the  Hon.  William  Wood,  LL.  D." 

Nothing  of  special  importance  marked  the  year  1880  to  father, 
except  the  birth  of  a  son  to  his  son  Dennistoun  and  the  birth  and 
death  of  a  daughter  to  Helen,  the  latter  event  grieving  him  deeply 
on  the  mother's  account. 

In  the  New  York  Herald  of  February  2,  1881,  I  find  an  article 
headed,  "  William  Wood  Reappointed."  After  stating  that  Mayor 
Grace  had  just  appointed  him  to  fill  the  vacancy  in  the  Board  of 
Education  caused  by  the  resignation  of  Charles  J.  Nehrbas,  and 
some  kindly  remarks,  the  article  concludes  :  "  It  was  said  yesterday 
that  Mr.  Wood's  non-reappointment  in  December,  1879,  was  due  to 
ex-Commissioner  Andrew  H.  Green,  and  that  if  it  had  not  been  for 
Mayor  Grace's  counter-influence  Commissioner  Nehrbas  would  have 
been  asked  to  resign  before  January  i  last,  so  that  Mayor  Cooper 
would  have  appointed  his  successor." 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.   KANE.  48 1 

Father  was  extremely  glad  to  return  to  his  work  in  the  board, 
and  was  appointed  to  visit  the  group  of  schools  assigned  to  Mr. 
Nehrbas,  and  was  placed  on  the  committees  of  Buildings,  Auditing, 
Course  of  Study  and  Schoolbooks,  By-Laws,  and  Normal  College. 

On  June  9,  1881,  my  brother  Chalmers  was  married  at  the 
Church  of  the  Ascension,  New  York,  to  Ellen  Appleton  Smith,  by 
her  father  the  Rev.  John  Cotton  Smitli,  D.  D.  Nellie's  paternal 
grandfather  was  the  Rev.  Thomas  Mather  Smith,  D.  D.,  president  of 
Kenyon  College,  Ohio.  Her  maternal  grandfather  was  General 
James  Appleton  of  Portland,  Me.,  Gloucester  and  Ipswich,  Mass. 
This  gentleman  was  at  one  time  candidate  for  Governor  of  Maine 
on  the  Prohibition  ticket,  and  was  reported  to  be  the  author  of  the 
first  prohibitory  law  proposed.  It  was  introduced  by  him  in  the 
Legislature  of  Massachusetts  in  the  early  part  of  this  century,  when 
he  was  a  member  of  that  body.  His  title  of  General  he  got  as  a  com- 
mander of  part  of  the  Massachusetts  militia  during  the  war  of  1812. 

We  had  had  so  many  intermarriages  in  our  family  that  Chalmers 
was  held  to  be  rather  proud  of  having  gone  outside  the  hereditary 
circle,  so  to  speak.  Our  father  was  much  amused  to  find  out,  some 
years  after  the  marriage,  that  William  Smith,  son  of  the  Governor  of 
Connecticut,  Nellie's  great  granduncle,  had  married  Helen  Livings- 
ton, daughter  of  Chalmers'  great  grandaunt  Martha  Kane  Livingston, 
So  there  was  a  real  connection  of  their  pedigrees  ! 

Father's  school  and  committee  work  has  been  so  often  referred  to 
that  I  need  hardly  dwell  more  upon  it.  His  term  of  office  expired 
on  the  I  St  of  January  1883,  and  Mayor  Grace  reappointed  him  for 
the  following  term  of  three  years.  There  are  certain  years  in  one's  life 
which  seem  to  be  crowded  with  events,  making  them  stand  apart  from 
all  the  others.  Such  a  one  was  1883  to  father.  In  the  early  winter 
his  youngest  son,  Van  Home  Lawrence,  sailed  for  Australia  with  the 
intention  of  settling  there.  His  departure  was  a  great  grief  to  his 
father,  who  was  much  attached  to  him,  and  never  ceased  to  hope  for 
his  return.  The  severe  illness  of  one  of  my  sisters  and  the  increas. 
ing  ill-health  of  another,  together  with  the  death  of  his  old  friend 
and  son-in-law,  Thos.  L.  Kane,  depressed  his  spirits.  He  had  been 
a  solitary  man  for  years,  although  he  entered  into  the  joys  and  sor- 
rows of  his  children.  But  we  were  all  engrossed  in  our  cares  and 
struggles  with  the  world,  and  he  wSiS  Jirst  in  no  one's  heart,  dearly  as 


402  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

all  loved  him.  It  was  therefore  perhaps  not  so  surprising  as  we  felt 
it  to  be,  when  we  learned  that  he  contemplated  marrying  again. 
Miss  Helen  Mason"^  at  first  refused  the  offer  of  his  hand,  fearing  that 
the  marriage  might  distress  his  children.  The  difference  of  more 
than  thirty  years  of  age  between  them  was  sufficient  to  alarm  their 
friends  for  their  future  happiness.  Father's  habits  were  the  simplest, 
his  life  the  most  monotonous  round  of  duty  conceivable,  and  he  was 
too  old  to  change  them.  Miss  Mason  sailed  for  Europe  in  May, 
1883,  and  during  her  absence  made  up  her  mind.  Their  engagement 
was  announced  upon  her  return  in  October,  and  they  were  married 
in  her  mother's  house,  No.  113  East  Nineteenth  Street,  New  York, 
by  Bishop  Henry  C.  Potter,  on  the  6th  of  December. 

Never  did  a  marriage  more  completely  verify  the  good  judgment 
of  the  contracting  parties.  Usually  the  happiness  of  wedded  life  is 
found  in  mutual  concessions,  but  in  this  case  it  was  dependent  on 
the  generous  abnegation  of  self,  sweetness  of  temper,  and  devoted 
fulfillment  of  duty  of  an  excellent  wife.  One  after  another  she 
gained  the  affection  and  respect  of  her  stepchildren,  and  in  spite  of 
the  power  which  a  less  forgiving  woman  might  have  wielded  to  separ- 
ate her  husband  from  them,  her  influence  was  always  exerted  in 
favor  of  peace  and  harmony.  His  "children  rise  up  and  call  her 
blessed,"  for  he  found  in  her  all  that  was  needed  of  loving  friendship 
and  fond  tenderness  and  care  to  make  his  last  years  happy.  She 
relinquished  for  him  the  gratification  of  her  love  of  music,  since  he 
could  not  appreciate  it,  and  all  the  freedom  of  the  life  of  wealthy 
ease  to  which  she  was  accustomed.  But  she  gained  a  wise  counselor 
in  the  cares  that  soon  came  upon  her,  when  the  death  of  her 
father  laid  upon  her  the  management  of  her  own  and  her  invalid 
mother's  estates,  and  the  comforter  she  needed  when,  in  the  course 
of  a  very  few  years,  death  robbed  her  of  almost  every  one  of  her 
nearest  relatives.  Father  had  none  of  the  selfish  ways  of  age.  His 
old-world  courtesy  made  him  a  perfect  gentleman  in  act  and  speech? 
while  his  good  health  and  active  habits  made  him  seem  at  least  ten 
years  younger  than  his  actual  age.f 

*  See  Appendix. 

•j-  I  have  taken  the  opportunity  of  Mrs.  Wood's  absence  in  Europe  to  pay  a 
deserved  tribute  to  her  virtues,  which  she  would  not  permit  me  to  do  if  she  were 
aware  of  my  intention. — E.  D.  K. 


CONTINUATION   BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  483 

The  constitution  of  his  household  remained  unchanged,  his 
youngest  daughter  continuing  to  manage  it,  while  his  wife  simply 
devoted  her  time  to  being  his  and  her  mother's  companion.  She 
would  not  even  take  her  place  at  the  head  of  the  table,  but  sat  at  his 
right  hand,  so  that  he  could  talk  quietly  to  her  without  interfering 
with  the  merry  voices  of  his  grandchildren  as  they  gathered  around 
the  board.  Father  was  scarcely  deaf  at  this  time,  but  we  charged 
him  with  coquetting  with  the  infirmity  and  proving  himself  to  hear 
perfectly  well  when  an  aside  not  meant  for  his  ear  was  spoken.  As 
the  years  went  on,  however,  there  was  considerable  deafness  in  his 
right  ear,  so  that  many  voices  speaking  animatedly  confused  him. 
He,  therefore,  formed  a  habit  of  dining  out  once  a  week  with  his 
wife,  usually  at  Delmonico's,  so  that  his  young  people  might  have 
guests  of  their  own^age  at  home,  while  he  could  enjoy  having  Mrs. 
Wood's  society  or  the  company  of  one  chosen  guest  whose  voice  he 
could  easily  hear.  Usually,  President  Hunter  of  the  Normal  Col- 
lege would  dine  with  him  after  the  board  meetings,  and  thus  he  kept 
au  courant  with  the  interests  of  the  college  to  his  latest  day. 

Father  has  told  how  he  was  brought  up  as  a  member  of  the  Free 
Church  of  Scotland  by  a  mother  strongly  tinctured  with  Sandeman- 
ianism.  Then  he  became  a  member  of  the  Independent — equival- 
ent to  the  Congregational — Church  while  living  in  Liverpool,  and 
after  attending  Dr.  Hutton's  Dutch  Reformed  Church  in  New  York 
and  then  the  ^Presbyterian  services  at  Dr.  Potts'  church,  settled 
down  as  a  member,  and  for  many  years  an  elder,  of  the  Dutch  Re- 
formed Church.  Mrs.  Wood  was  an  Episcopalian,  a  member  of  Dr, 
Huntington's  congregation,  and  while  she  was  liberal-minded  enough 
to  go  with  her  husband  morning  and  evening,  the  old  narrowness 
of  his  early  training  had  long  disappeared,  so  that  he  regularly 
went  with  her  to  the  vesper  service  in  Grace  Church.  He  enjoyed 
Dr.  Huntington's  preaching,  and  the  beauty  of  the  service  greatly 
impressed  him.  He  used  often  to  say  (partly  to  tease  the  last  Pres- 
byterian left  among  his  children)  that  if  he  had  his  life  to  live  over 
again  he  thought  he  would  turn  Episcopalian. 

In  July,  1884,  a  bronze  copy  of  Houdon's  statue  of  Washington 
was^unveiled  in  Riverside  Park.  The  statue  had  been  subscribed 
for  by  the  pupils  of  the  public  schools.  William  M.  Tweed  and 
others  had  originally  made  application  in  1870  that  the  money  should 


484  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

be  raised  by  a  penny  subscription.  The  finance  committee  of  the 
Board  of  Education  decided  that  the  subscriptions  might  range  from 
one  to  ten  cents,  and  the  statue  was  paid  for  on  July  28,  1874. 
Then  the  statue  rested  ten  years  in  the  basement  cellar  of  the  Ar- 
senal of  the  Central  Park.  Finally,  through  the  exertions  of  General 
Viele,  a  number  of  public-spirited  citizens  subscribed  for  a  pedestal, 
on  the  base  of  which  was  inscribed  "  A  Tribute  from  the  Pupils  of 
the  Public  Schools  of  New  York."  It  was  presented  to  the  city 
on  their  behalf  by  Commissioner  Wood  in  a  speech  which  was  much 
praised  in  the  papers,  but  which  I  omit  because  the  most  interesting 
anecdotes  in  it  have  been  recounted  in  the  journal  of  his  trip  through 
Arkansas. 

The  children  of  the  schools  had  a  grand  festival  on  the  occasion, 
five  hundred  boys  and  girls  being  selected  to  march  in  procession 
and  sing  patriotic  odes,  while  two  lads  delivered  declamations  on 
the  character  of  Washington. 

Father's  life  now  flowed  quietly  on,  working  faithfully  as  com- 
missioner during  all  the  school  year,  and  finding  plenty  to  do  in  the 
vacations  in  looking  up  sites  for  new  schools,  inspecting  the  sanitary 
conditions  of  old  ones,  or  the  repairs  in  progress.  I  also  remember 
him  at  times  when  he  was  on  that  committee  as  absorbed  in  the  ex- 
amination of  proi)Osed  text-books.  But  he  always  saved  up  a  num- 
ber of  the  reviews  and  books  of  the  year  to  read  in  the  holiday 
months.  He  was  not  a  novel  reader,  though  at  long  intervals  he 
keenly  enjoyed  a  masterpiece  of  fiction,  nor  was  he  a  profound  stu- 
dent. But  he  had  a  wide  range  of  reading  in  history  and  belles- 
lettres,  and  a  well-stored  memory  of  what  he  had  read.  He  could 
not  bring  himself  to  admire  the  poets  of  the  present  day,  that  is,  if 
there  are  any  worthy  to  succeed  those  who  were  in  their  prime  thirty 
years  ago.  But  few  men  of  his  age  are  as  familiar  as  he  was  with 
the  writings  of  the  great  masters  of  poetic  expression. 

Mayor  Grace  was  indisposed  to  reappoint  father  as  commissioner 
for  the  term  beginning  January  i,  18S3.  I  think  that  he  had  stipulated 
that  father  should  endorse  some  political  action,  which  he  refused  to 
do.  Whatever  the  mayor's  reason  may  have  been,  however,  his 
fellow-commissioners  gratified  father  in  the  highest  degree  by  their 
action.  Frederic  R.  Coudert  offered  to  resign  in  liis  favor,  and 
Joseph  W.  Drexel  actually  did  so.     When  he  had  served  this  term 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.  ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  485 

Mayor  Grace  reappointed  him  to  serve  from  January  i,  1886  for 
three  years  more  ;  but  while  father  felt  himself  to  be  fully  equal  to 
the  work,  served  on  all  the  committees,  and  attended  every  meeting 
of  the  board,  his  family  insisted  upon  his  fulfilling  an  old  promise 
that  he  would  resign  when  he  attained  the  age  of  eighty.  In  the 
summer  of  1888  he  was  invited  to  deliver  the  oration  at  the  unveil- 
ing of  the  Burns  monument  at  Albany,  and  although  he  declined 
to  do  so,  he  addressed  a  letter  to  the  chairman  of  the  Committee 
of  Arrangements,  which  contains  some  reminiscences  which  the 
limited  space  at  my  command  obliges  me  to  omit. 

Father  was  eighty  years  old  on  October  21,  1888,  and,  in  accord- 
ance with  his  promise,  wrote  to  Mayor  Hewitt,  tendering  his 
resignation  as  commissioner,  receiving  the  following  reply  : 

"Mayor's  Office, 
"New  York,  November  2,  1888. 
"  William  Wood,  Esq.,  No.  4  West  Eighteenth  Street. 

"  My  Dear  Sir  :  It  gives  me  real  pain  to  receive  your  letter  of 
the  ist  instant,  in  v/hich  you  resign  your  position  as  a  Commissioner 
of  Public  Instruction.  You  only  do  me  justice  by  the  assumption 
that  I  would  have  reappointed  you  on  the  expiration  of  your  term 
on  the  2ist  instant.  I  recognize  your  right,  however,  to  be  relieved 
from  further  public  service.  For  nearly  twenty  years  you  have 
devoted  yourself  to  the  cause  of  public  education.  You  have  been 
president  of  the  board  and,  all  things  considered,  have  been  its  most 
conspicuous  member  during  your  long  period  of  service.  No  one 
can  estimate  the  value  of  such  disinterested  labor  as  you  have  given 
to  the  cause  of  education.  You  have  seen  it  grow  with  the  growth 
of  the  city,  and  you  liave  literally  been  the  father  of  the  extension 
of  higher  education  among  women  in  this  city.  I  am  glad  to  know 
that  your  strength  is  not  abated,  and  I  hope  that  you  will  continue 
for  many  years  to  take  a  deep  interest  in  that  department  of  the 
public  service  with  which  you  have  been  so  long  identified.  You 
will  be  welcomed  to  the  schools  and  colleges  of  the  city,  and  I  am 
sure  you  will  derive  profound  satisfaction  from  the  gratitude  of 
those  who  owe  their  success  in  life  to  your  devotion  to  their  advance- 
ment. On  behalf  of  the  Ci'y  of  New  York  I  tender  to  you  its 
grateful  acknowledgment  for  all  you  have  done,  and  I  trust  that  your 


486  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

remaining  years  will  be  as  full  of  honor  and  happiness  as  I  know  your 
past  to  have  been. 

"Abram  Hewitt  (Mayor)." 

Extract  from  the  minutes  of  the  Board  of  Education,  November 
7,  i8S8: 

"The  president  read  a  communication  from  Commissioner  William 
Wood,  LL.  D.,  as  follows  : 

"  '  4  West  Eighteenth  Street, 
"'New  York,  November  i,  i888. 
My  Dear  Mr.  President  : 

Benedick  says  that  when  he  "  swore  that  he  would  die  a  bachelor 
he  never  thought  that  he  would  live  to  be  married,"  so  when  three 
years  ago  I  promised  my  family,  in  response  to  their  urgent  request? 
that  I  would  not  accept  another  nomination  to  the  Board  of  Educa- 
tion after  I  entered  my  eighty-first  year,  I  had  little  expectation  of 
reaching  that  advanced  age,  but  I  have,  and  in  conformity  with  my 
promise,  I  have  this  day  sent  in  my  resignation  as  commissioner  of 
common  schools  to  Mayor  Hewitt.  My  family  hope  and  expect  that 
I  will  keep  the  flame  of  life  from  wasting  by  repose,  and  as  my 
health  never  was  better  I  am  not  without  hopes  that  I  may  still  have 
some  time  to  "crown"  (in  Goldsmith's  words)  "a  youth  of  labor 
with  an  age  of  ease."  I  part  from  you  and  my  colleagues  of  the 
Board  of  Education  with  deep  regret.  My  work  on  the  board  for 
nearly  twenty  years  has  been  a  labor  of  love  ;  it  is  a  noble  work, 
and  I  pray  God  that  he  will  abundantly  bless  your  efforts  and  those 
of  my  other  colleagues  in  the  important  cause  of  popular  educa- 
tion.    I  am,  my  dear  Mr.  President, 

"  '  Yours,  with  much  esteem, 

"  'William  Wood. 
"  '  To  President  J.  Edward  Simmons, 

"  '  Board  of  Education,  146  Grand  Street,  New  York.' 

"  The  president  addressed  the  board  as  follows  : 

"  'Commissioners  :  The  letter  I  have  just  read  brings  us  the  un- 
welcome intelligence  that  our  oldest  colleague,  the  Hon.  William 
Wood,  has  severed  his  connection  with  this  board.     Surely,  we  ought 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  487 

not  to  permit  this  occasion  to  pass  witliout  offering  an  expression 
of  the  sincere  feeling  of  regret  with  which  we  are  compelled  to  bid 
farewell  to  one  who  has  bound  himself  to  our  sympathies  and  our 
lasting  regard  by  his  pure  and  lofty  character,  his  gentleness  of 
heart,  his  brilliancy  of  intellect,  and  by  his  long  and  devoted  service 
in  behalf  of  the  common  schools  of  the  city  of  New  York.  Mr. 
Wood  received  his  appointment  as  school  commissioner  in  May, 
1869,  and  for  nearly  twenty  years,  intermitted  only  by  the  year  1880, 
he  has  consecrated  his  time,  his  critical  knowledge,  his  sympathetic 
interest,  and  his  watchful  vigilance  to  the  development  and  prog- 
ress of  free  education.  As  an  accomplished  scholar  he  would 
thoroughly  appreciate  the  inestimable  blessings  thai  a  cultured  mind 
brings  to  its  possessor.  His  views  on  educational  questions  were 
always  broad  and  liberal,  and  his  labors  were  to  the  end  that  the 
common  people  might  drink  deep  at  the  fountain  of  knowledge, 
believing  that  the  security  of  the  state  depends  on  an  intelligent 
exercise  of  the  privileges  of  citizenship. 

"  'At  an  early  period  his  guiding  power  made  itself  known  and  ac- 
knowledged in  this  board,  and,  whether  as  chairman  or  as  a  member 
of  the  various  standing  committees  his  judgment  and  promptitude 
have  been  as  characteristic  as  his  taste  has  been  true  to  the  sphere  in 
which  he  has  loved  to  labor.  During  four  years,  from  his  election 
in  January,  1876,  to  the  close  of  1879,  Commissioner  Wood  occupied 
the  chair  as  presiding  officer.  The  records  show  that  his  knowledge 
of  parliamentary  law,  his  uniform  courtesy,  the  unswerving  faithfulness 
of  his  decisions,  and  the  celerity  with  which  he  dispatched  the  busi- 
ness of  the  board  called  from  those  over  whom  he  had  been  chosen  to 
preside  the  strongest  expressions  of  appreciation.  The  gavel  in  his 
hand  was  a  symbol  of  authority  guided  by  a  wise  discretion,  cheer- 
fully submitted  to  because  of  the  confidence  reposed  in  his  judgment 
and  the  affectionate  esteem  entertained  for  him  by  all.  On  the  floor, 
as  a  member  of  the  board,  his  influence  was  as  marked  as  in  com- 
mittee or  in  the  chair.  His  scholarly  attainments,  his  literary 
acquisitions,  his  fluency  of  speech,  his  great  resources  of  incident 
and  illustration,  made  him  a  ready  and  formidable  debater.  Like  a 
valiant  knight,  he  rode  into  the  arena  with  his  lance  well  poised, 
ready  to  drive  it  into  any  crevice  that  might  be  exposed  in  his  ad- 
versary's armor.      He  was  a  bold  and  an  aggressive  advocate  of  any 


AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

cause  he  espoused,  but  he  never  forgot  the  amenities  of  debate  and 
never  intentionally  wounded  any  man's  feelings. 

"  '  "  His  wit  in  the  combat,  as  gentle  as  bright, 

Never  carried  a  heart-stain  away  on  its  blade." 

" '  He  carefully  studied  every  new  question  as  it  arose,  with  a  wish 
to  determine  its  value  in  its  bearing  upon  educational  progress  ; 
and  endowed  with  wisdom,  gained  by  experience  and  by  patient 
study  his  counsel  and  voice  have  ever  been  at  the  command  of  his 
associates. 

"  'By  personal  visitation,  again  and  again,  he  has  familiarized  him- 
self with  every  school  building  in  the  city,  and  he  can  truthfully  say 
that  he  has  entered  every  classroom  under  the  jurisdiction  of  the 
board.  His  counsel  to  principals  and  teachers,  and  his  eloquent 
addresses  to  the  thousands  of  pupils  who  have  heard  the  words  of 
wisdom  and  encouragement  that  have  fallen  from  his  lips,  have  made 
him  the  best  known,  and,  deservedly,  the  most  popular  member  of 
the  board. 

"  '  Commissioner  Wood  was  an  earnest  believer  in  the  higher  educa- 
tion at  the  expense  of  the  State,  and  conspicuous  among  his  labors 
none  will  stand  more  honorable  than  the  enduring  services  he  has  ren- 
dered in  the  organization,  founding,  and  supervision  of  the  Normal 
College.  It  was  his  appropriate  task  to  make  the  historical  address 
at  the  laying  of  the  corner  stone  of  the  edifice  in  187 1,  and  it  has 
been  his  privilege  to  see  it  matured  into  a  splendid  type  of  the 
system  of  popular  education.  A  year  or  more  ago  he  stated  in  this 
board  : 

" '  "  It  has  been  an  ambition  with  me  for  many  years  that  I  might 
live  to  see  the  day  when  the  city  of  New  York  would  accord  to  girls 
the  same  educational  facilities  enjoyed  by  boys."  This  ambition  has 
been  gratified,  for  he  has  lived  to  see  the  Normal  College,  a  college 
in  fact  as  well  as  in  name,  invested  with  the  statutory  diginity  of  all 
the  other  colleges  of  the  State.  Well  may  he  say,  in  view  of  its 
achievements,  "  Esto  perpetua."  Kind  in  heart,  courtly  in  manner, 
earnest  in  purpose,  honest  and  sincere  in  speech  and  action,  unsel- 
fishly devoted  to  the  cause  of  education,  with  a  tender  and  paternal 
interest   in   the   welfare    of   everyone   connected  with   the  common 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  489 

school  system  of  this  city,  loved  by  the  children,  honored  by  the 
teachers,  respected  by  all,  William  Wood  retires  forever  from  this 
board.  His  daily  life  among  us  has  been  a  beautiful  exemplification 
of  the  proverb,  '  A  good  name  is  rather  to  be  chosen  than  great 
riches,'  and  leaves  us  with  a  remembrance  of  a  career  of  usefulness 
rarely  if  ever  equaled  and  never  excelled. 

"  '  "  He  was  a  man,  take  him  for  all  in  all, 
I  shall  not  look  upon  his  like  again." 

"  '  I  respectfully  submit  the  following  resolutions  and  move  their 
adoption  : 

^^  ^ Resolved,  That  in  retiring  from  the  activities  of  his  official  posi- 
tion as  a  member  of  this  board,  the  Hon.  William  Wood,  LL.  D., 
bears  with  him  our  profound  appreciation  of  his  eminent  and  suc- 
cessful labor  in  the  cause  of  public  education,  and  for  ourselves  and 
on  behalf  of  the  constituency  we  represent,  we  tender  to  him  the 
homage  of  our  gratitude  and  regard. 

"  '  Resolved,  That  a  copy  of  this  minute,  signed  by  the  president, 
by  each  commissioner,  and  by  the  clerk  of  this  board,  be  transmitted 
to  the  Hon.  William  Wood.' 

"  The  president /r(?  tern,  put  the  question  whether  the  board  would 
adopt  the  minute  and  the  resolutions  offered  by  the  president,  and 
it  was  decided  unanimously  in  the  affirmative. 

"  Commissioner  Schmitt  moved  that  the  communication  from  Com- 
missioner Wood,  together  with  the  address  and  resolutions  offered 
by  the  president,  be  entered  in  full  in  the  minutes. 

"Which  was  unanimously  adopted. 

"  Commissioner  Holt  offered  the  following  : 

"  ''Resolved,  That  the  minutes  of  the  board  be  regularly  sent  to 
Ex-Commissioner  Wood,  together  with  the  directory,  manual,  an- 
nual report,  and  other  documents  when  published.' 

"  Adopted. 

"  Commissioner  Schmitt  offered  the  following  : 

"  '  Resolved,  That  as  a  mark  of  esteem  for  Commissioner  Wood,  he 


490  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD, 

be  and  is  hereby  invited  at  all  times  to  occupy  a  seat  with  the  mem- 
bers of  this  board.' 

"  Which  was  unanimously  adopted. 
"  The  president  resumed  the  chair. 

"  J.  Edward  Simmons,  President. 

"J.  D.  Vermilye.  Henry  Schmitt. 

Ferdinand  Traud,  Henry  L.  Sprague. 

Wm.  a.  Cole.  Miles  M.  O'Brien. 

William  Lummis.  Samuel  M.  Purdy. 

Mary  Nash  Agnew.  De  Witt  J.  Seligman. 

Grace  H.  Dodge.  Charles  L.  Holt. 

H.  Walter  Webb.  F.  W.  Devoe. 

Randolph  Guggenheimer.  Edward  J.  H.  Tamsen.  ■ 
Robert  M.  Galea  way. 
'                                                                 "  Arthur  McMullin,  Clerk." 

The  kindly  thoughtfulness  of  his  fellow-commissioners  in  provid- 
ing that  he  should  still  continue  to  have  a  seat  with  them  at  all 
times,  and  receive  the  publications  of  the  Board  of  Education, 
probably  prolonged  father's  life.  He  continued  to  take  a  deep  in- 
terest in  educational  affairs,  and  particularly  in  the  growth  and 
prosperity  of  the  Normal  College.  He  made  more  than  fourteen 
hundred  visits  to  it  in  all,  and  it  could  literally  be  said  of  him  in 
reference  to  it,  as  the  old   Scottish   psalm-book   says   of  the  Jews' 

love  for  Zion  : 

"  Thy  saints  take  pleasure  in  her  stones  ; 
Her  very  dust  to  them  is  dear." 

The  passing  years  saw  his  active  step  slacken,  his  stately  form 
grow  stooping,  and  the  fire  of  his  eye  grow  dim.  The  young  girls 
who  remembered  his  active  work  among  them  went  out  into  the 
world,  but  their  successors,  term  after  term,  gave  him  their  respect- 
ful welcome  as  he  came  among  them. 

He  found  pleasure  in  writing  his  autobiography,  and  in  many 
ways  his  life  was  happy.  But  he  cared  too  much  for  his  children, 
and  his  children's  children,  who  were  still  fighting  the  battle  of  life, 
to  be  able  to  enter  fully  into  the  tranquil  joy  of  the  land  of  Beulah, 
in  whose  sunset  glow  the  aged  pilgrims,  "  because  they  were  weary, 
betook  themselves  to  rest.     There  they  did  not  sleep,  and  yet  they 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  49 1 

received  so  much  refreshing  as  if  they  had  slept  their  sleep  ever  so 
soundly.  .  .  In  this  land  they  heard  nothing,  saw  nothing,  tasted 
nothing  that  was  offensive  to  the  stomach  or  mind  ;  only  when  they 
tasted  of  the  water  of  the  river  over  which  they  were  to  go  they 
thought  that  it  tasted  a  little  bitterish  to  the  palate  ;  but  it  proved 
sweeter  when  it  was  down. 

"  Then  it  came  to  pass  a  while  after  that  there  was  a  post  in  the 
town  that  inquired  after  Mr.  Honest,  .  .  .  and  for  a  token  that  his 
message  was  true  delivered  into  his  hand  these  lines  :  '  All  the 
daughters  of  music  shall  be  brought  low.'  .  .  When  the  day  that 
he  was  to  be  gone  was  come  he  addressed  himself  to  go  over  the 
river.  Now  the  river  at  that  time  overflowed  its  banks  in  some 
places  ;  but  Mr.  Honest,  in  his  lifetime,  had  spoken  to  one  Good- 
conscience  to  meet  him  there,  the  which  also  he  did,  and  lent  him 
his  hand,  and  so  helped  him  over.  The  last  words  of  Mr.  Honest 
were,  'Grace  reigns  ! '     So  he  left  the  world." 


"  Sunset  and  evening  star, 

And  one  clear  call  for  me  ! 
And  may  there  be  no  moaning  of  the  bar 
When  I  put  out  to  sea. 

"  But  such  a  tide  as  moving  seems  asleep, 
Too  full  for  sound  and  foam. 
When  that  which  drew  from  out  the  boundless  deep 
Turns  again  home. 

"  Twilight  and  evening  bells, 
And  after  that  the  dark  ! 
And  may  there  be  no  sadness  of  farewells 
When  I  embark. 

"  For  though  from  out  our  bourne  of  time  and  place 
The  flood  may  bear  me  far, 
I  hope  to  see  my  Pilot  face  to  face 
When  I  have  crossed  the  bar." 

These  lines  touched  father's  heart,  and  he  repeated  them  many 
times  during  the  last  months  of  his  life,  with  a  voice  so  full  of  earn- 


492  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

est  feeling,  that  we  knew  how  thoroughly  the  poet's  aspiration  was 
his.  To  him,  as  to  Tennyson,  the  prayer  was  granted.  No  death 
could  have  been  more  peaceful  than  father's.  He  had  looked  for- 
ward with  dread  to  the  possibility  of  a  long  and  painful  illness  that 
would  distress  those  who  loved  him  ;  or,  worse,  that  he  might  live  to 
sink  into  "utter  childishness  and  mere  oblivion."  His  letters  to  me 
frequently  referred  to  his  fear  of  being  burdensome  through  in- 
firmity. Though  few  men  keep  to  such  an  age  as  his  such  vigor  as 
he  possessed,  and  are  so  little  dependent  on  others,  he  was  very  con- 
scious of  his  gradual  loss  of  strength,  increasing  dimness  of  vision, 
and  dullness  of  hearing.  In  his  last  years  he  ever  seemed  to  keep 
in  remembrance  that  he  must  soon  go  from  us,  and  to  heap  kindness 
on  kindness,  to  give  gentle  and  loving  words  and  fond  praise  to  each 
one  whom  he  loved.  As  widows  and  orphans  crowded  to  show  the 
garments  tliat  Dorcas  had  made,  so  the  members  of  father's  house- 
hold, and  his  children's  children,  tell  the  story  of  his  peculiar 
sympathy  and  tenderness  to  each.  /  am  tempted  to  dwell  on  his 
goodness  to  my  sons  when  they  came  to  show  him  their  brides  last 
year  ;  but  that  the  knowledge  presses  upon  me  how  good  he  was, 
too,  to  all  his  descendants.  Each  of  us  treasures  some  thoughtful 
kindness  that  seems  now  as  if  it  liad  been  a  farewell  before  he  left 
us.  It  helped  him  to  keep  all  his  descendants  in  remembrance,  that 
to  the  day  of  his  death  he  prayed  for  everyone  of  them  by  name. 
Like  Job,  he  "  rose  up  early  in  the  morning,  and  offered  burnt  offer- 
ings according  to  the  number  of  them  all  :  for  Job  said,  '  It  may  be 
that  my  sons  have  sinned,  and  cursed  God  in  their  hearts.'  Thus 
did  Job  continually."  I  had  an  old  friend,  who  served  in  my 
family  for  upward  of  forty  years,  and  speaking  of  her  death  to  my 
father  he  mentioned  that  he  had  prayed  for  Jane  daily  for  many 
years,  and  on  my  expressing  surprise  he  told  me  that  he  asked  God's 
blessing  on  us  all  individually,  though  only  making  special  interces- 
sion when  he  knew  us  to  be  in  special  strait.  He  was  too  old  to 
kneel  so  long  now,  but  after  he  had  risen  early  and  bathed  he  lay  on 
his  couch,  read  his  morning  portion  of  the  Bible,  and  then,  folding 
his  hands,  commended  us  all  to  God's  care  before  he  descended  to 
hold  family  worship. 

Passages  from  his  letters  to  me  during  1894  show  that  he  still  did 
a  good  deal  of  work,  and  was  able  to  take  a  considerable  amount  of 


.      CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.    KANE.  493 

exercise,  and  they  form  a  more  or  less  connected  narrative  of  his 
life  during  the  time. 

January  4  he  wrote  :  "  I  have  been  so  busy  this  week  that  I 
liardly  know  whether  I  am  standing  on  my  head  or  on  my  heels.  I 
have  had  a  bad  headache  to-day  from  overwork  yesterday,  but  have 
taken  bromide,  and  feel  better  this  afternoon.  To-morrow  and 
Saturday  are  also  busy  days,  that  is,  for  my  present  age,  when  the 
grasshopper  is  a  burden.  All  my  present  work  used  to  be  a  mere 
adjunct  to  my  regular  routine,  and  never  felt  in  former  days. 

"  J.  Walter  has  been  ill,  as  you  know.  I  am  just  going  to  walk 
down  to  his  house  to  see  how  the  dear  old  gentleman  is. 

"  February  9.  I  was  up  at  the  Normal  College  on  Wednesday 
morning  and  walked  home,  2^  miles. 

"  February  15.  Yesterday,  St.  Valentine's  day,  was  the  twenty- 
fourth  anniversary  of  the  opening  of  the  Normal  College,  and  of 
course  I  went  up  there. 

"  I  never  received  such  a  greeting  as  I  did  then,  and  my  head 
aches  now  from  the  excitement.  I  read  the  103d  Psalm,  having 
had  the  gas  lit,  and  fancied  that  was  to  be  the  end  of  my  individual 
action,  but  they  would  have  me  speak.  After  I  got  on  my  legs  I 
found  that  I  spoke  as  fluently  and  easily  as  ever,  much  to  my  own 
surprise. 

"  March  6.  Went  up  to  the  Normal  College  at  9  A.  M.  Dr.  Hun- 
ter asked  me  to  give  him  an  hour  or  two,  as  he  wished  my  views  on 
some  important  educational  matters  that  are  to  be  legislated  about. 
Gave  him  them,  but  said  :  '  Now,  I  have  a  cracking  headache,  but 
I  dare  say  when  I  get  into  the  fresh  air  it  will  relieve  me'  ;  but  it 
didn't. 

"  March  7.  Went  to  see  the  head  of  the  moose  shot  by  J.  Waller 
the  younger,  and  preserved  and  stuffed  at  Guenther's.  Ascended 
by  elevator  to  a  dingy  room.  'There,'  said  the  man  in  attendance, 
'  is  Mr.  Wood's  great  moose  head,  and  his  friend  Mr.  Appleton's 
smaller  one.'  I  could  see  neither,  and,  going  nearer,  fell  over  some- 
thing full  on  my  knees  and  head,  shaking  the  brains  in  the  latter. 

"The  man  made  some  moral  remarks  about  people's  sight  failing 
as  they  got  old.  '  How  old  do  you  think  I  am  ? '  I  asked.  '  About 
seventy-two,'  he  answered,  so  the  compliment  to  my  apparent  age 
was  some  '  balm  in  Gilead.'     But  I  was  so  shaken  up  that  my  dear 


494  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

womenkind,  unknown  to  me,  sent  for  Dr.  Swasey  last  night,  and  he 
has  put  me  back  upon  strychnine,  etc. 

"  March  15.  Dr.  Swasey  prescribes  for  me  'absence  from  worry 
about  anything ' — which  it  is  easy  to  prescribe.  It  reduces  one  to  a 
sort  of  living  death,  but  it  is  better  for  '  the  friends  I  hold  so  dear  ' 
than  the  actual  thing  at  Greenwood. 

"  Harriet  became  my  amanuensis  this  morning  in  proceeding  with 
my  '  auto,'  and  a  capital  one  she  makes,  writing  almost  as  fast  as  I 
can  dictate.  The  'auto'  has  been  interrupted  for  nearly  three 
months." 

During  the  next  few  weeks  my  father  wrote  to  me  of  his  anxiety 
and  grief  over  the  illness  and  death,  first,  of  my  daughter-in-law 
Mrs.  Evan  Kane,  and  next  of  little  Cyril  Hoskier,  his  great-grand- 
son, the  child  of  his  dearly  loved  granddaughter  Harriet  Amelia 
(Wood)  Hoskier,  and  then  of  Mrs.  Hoskier's  own  extreme  illness. 

April  27,  he  must  have  been  feeling  stronger,  for  he  wrote  : 

"  Walter  Watts  having  gone  back  to  his  work,  is  no  longer  available 
for  my  service  at  the  Safe  Deposit,  and  so  dear  L.,  v^^ho  has  been 
longing  for  the  chance  of  helping  me,  was  down  there  with  me  on 
Wednesday  for  three  hours,  and  yesterday  about  an  hour  and  a-half, 
and  did  the  work  (cutting  coupons)  *  as  if  she  had  been  used  to  it 
all  her  life. 

"  I  am  writing  this  before  breakfast,  and  immediately  after  it  I 
am  going  up  to  the  Normal  College. 

"May  10.  I  heard  that  'my  pastor,'  Rev.  Dr.  Burrell,  was  ill, 
and  I  was  moved  to  call  upon  him  yesterday  at  his  house,  248  West 

*  Father  acted  as  trustee  under  his  mother's  will  for  his  sisters,  Mrs.  Cross, 
Mrs.  Ferguson,  and  Mrs.  Pell,  and  subsequently  for  the  beneficiaries  under  the 
will  of  his  aunt,  Miss  Helen  Wood.  For  more  than  sixty  years  he  transacted  the 
business  thus  devolving  upon  him,  without  a  word  of  complaint  about  the  time  and 
trouble  it  gave  him.  He  never  took  a  commission  nor  accepted  payment  in  any 
form.  He  seemed  to  feel  that  this  sort  of  work  was  the  natural  right  and  duty  of 
a  man  toward  his  kinswomen,  to  be  performed  without  question,  as  one  would  eat 
or  drink. 

The  cutting  of  coupons  to  which  he  refers,  and  in  which  he  never  accepted  help 
till  the  last  few  months  of  his  life,  was  a  lengthy  and  puzzling  performance  to  those 
who  then  began  to  share  the  work.  His  investments  had  long  been  made,  but  as 
the  coupons  represented  so  many  interests  besides  his  own,  he  had  to  cut  and  assort 
them,  and  on  a  subsequent  day  collect  the  moneys  and  remit  to  all  his  wards. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  495 

Seventy-fifth  Street,  but  he  was  out  with  his  wife,  so,  as  I  was  in  the 
neighborhood,  I  thought  I  would  walk  to  Carrie  Perry's  in  Seven- 
tieth Street  (in  spite  of  the  hot  sunshine),  which  I  attempted,  but 
could  not  find  the  house.  I  had  forgotten  the  number,  but  knew  it 
was  a  combination  of  three  figures,  making  five,  and  so  had  to 
return  disappointed.  Anyway,  I  should  not  have  found  her  in,  for 
she  was  with  her  dear  mother*  at  the  Home  for  the  Friendless. 
She  was  yesterday  elected  a  colleague  of  her  mother's  there,  and 
told  by  a  minister  that  if  she  could  only  do  half  as  much  good  as 
H.  had  done,  they  would  all  be  thankful. 

''  May  17.  On  Tuesday  I  went  up  to  the  Normal  College,  and 
after  the  opening  exercises  were  over  Dr.  Hunter  and  I  went  up  to 
No.  6,  the  beautiful  new  school,  corner  Eighty-fifth  Street  and 
Madison  Avenue.  While  I  was  in  the  board  I  advocated  the  divi- 
sion of  the  schools  into  primary  six  grades,  and  grammar  eight 
grades,  and  finally  got  our  Training  Department  school  at  the  Nor- 
mal College  divided  into  fourteen  grades,  and  it  has  worked  well 
for  fifteen  or  sixteen  years.  In  this  splendid  new  school  they  have 
adopted  my  plan  and  have  a  female  department  of  fourteen  grades. 
It  is  presided  over  by  the  beautiful,  modest,  and  clever  Katie  Blake, 
one  of  our  graduates,  and  a  daughter  of  Mrs.  Devereux  Blake,  the 
great  woman's  rights  woman.  The  president  of  the  male  depart- 
ment, also  of  fourteen  grades,  has  not  yet  been  chosen.  The  school 
building  is  a  model  of  light,  ventilation,  and  sanitation,  a  real  credit 
to  our  system.  How  the  poor  boys  of  my  schooldays  ever  lived 
through  the  total  want  of  these  I  don't  know. 

*'  Coming  home  I  took  a  surface  car,  and  sat  with  a  delightful 
breeze  blowing  through  it,  and  '  all  the  windows  of  my  heart '  I 
opened  to  it,  and  so  yesterday  I  woke  with  such  an  influenza  that  I 
could  hardly  speak. 

"  May  31.  Your  interesting  letter  of  27th  reached  me  on  29th 
inst.  It  speaks  mainly  about  Dr.  Freeman.  Well,  the  breaking  up 
of  a  strong,  useful  man  is  interesting  to  '  yours  truly.' 

"  '  For  that  inevitable  road 

Which  leads  us  to  our  last  abode 
None  may  too  well  prepare.' 

*Mrs.  G.  B.  Watts,  vice  president  of  the  American  Female  Guardian  Society,  of 
which  the  Home  for  the  Friendless  is  one  of  the  buildings. 


496  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  Since  my  last  I  have  had  ups  and  downs  of  spirits.  Grasshop- 
pers become  more  and  more  a  burden,  but  I  have  a  capital  appetite, 
and  feel  ashamed  of  the  grasshoppers  getting  the  better  of  such  an 
apparently  stout,  healthy  man  as  I  am.  Speaking  of  your  Dr.  Freeman 
reminds  me  that  some  years  ago,  when  I  was  president  of  the  Board 
of  Education,  Dr.  Freeman,  the  English  historian,  was  here,  and  I 
called  to  pay  my  respects.     I  saluted  him  as  Dr.  Freeman. 

"  'Why  do  you  call  me  doctor?  '  said  the  vulgarish-looking  man. 

"  '  I  know  no  one  who  has  a  better  right  to  be  so  called,'  I  replied, 
'  since  you  are  D.  C.  L.  of  Oxford  and  LL.  D.  of  Cambridge.' 

"  'You  don't  call  Gladstone  doctor,'  said  he  ! 

"  June  21.  I  am  just  back  from  the  Normal  College — the  Twenty- 
fifth  Commencement — a  beautiful  sight.  About  three  hundred  girls 
graduated,  'clothed  in  white  samite,  mystic,  wonderful.'  Of  these, 
ninety  were  made  Bachelors  of  Arts  and  six  Bachelors  of  Science. 
I  stayed  till  half  past  one  in  the  afternoon,  but  grew  very  tired  and 
sad.  1  began  to  think,  like  the  child  in  Punch,  that  '  my  doll  was 
stuffed  with  sawdust.'     The  fact  is,  I  have  lived  too  long. 

"  June  28.  I  am  going  with  L.  to  Kaaterskill  on  July  3  for  a 
week.  There  was  a  time  when  I  had  so  much  committee  work  to 
attend  to  that  for  sixteen  years  I  was  never  out  of  the  city,  except  to 
take  a  swim  down  at  Manhattan  Beach  in  summer,  and  I  never  was 
in  better  health  in  my  life. 

"So  the  'old  man'  is  to  be  sacrificed  to  the  '  wee  man,' *  and 
neither  you  nor  Dr.  Harry  can  leave  the  latter.  Well,  it's  all  right, 
I  suppose,  and  I  must  'hope  on,  hope  ever'  for  the  day  when  I 
shall  see  you  and  the  little  doctor,  and  get  you  to  chapter  up  the 
little  of  my  '  auto'  that  I  have  written  since  you  were  here." 

The  pleasure  of  the  visit  to  Kaaterskill  was  marred  by  Mrs. 
Wood's  illness,  but  the  change  of  air  benefited  father,  and  both  were 
able  to  enjoy  the  last  three  days  of  their  stay.  They  returned  to 
New  York  to  receive  one  of  my  sons  and  his  wife,  whom  they  had 
invited,  according  to  father's  pleasant  custom,  to  stay  during  the 
holiday  absence  of  some  members  of  his  usually  crowded  household. 
To  us,  coming  from  the  mountains,  the  change,  even  to  the  city  of 
New  York   in   summer,  was  not   unpleasant,  for  father's  house  was 

*  My  infant  grandson,  left  an  orphan. — E.  D.  Kane. 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  497 

spacious  and  airy,  but  it  was  only  at  night  that  his  guests  were  there, 
as  he  had  planned  out  excursions  by  water  for  each  day.  Year  by 
year  he  laid  aside  a  sum  which  he  called  his  Fresh  Air  Fund,  and 
his  pleasure  was  to  take  party  after  party  of  his  grandchildren  and 
children  to  Manhattan  beach.  Before  he  was  eighty  he  always 
swam  with  the  best,  but  afterward  he  felt  that  he  must  cease  to  be 
more  than  an  onlooker.  But  even  in  1894  he  still  enjoyed  accom- 
panying his  guests  to  the  Beach  for  the  day,  watching  the  groups  of 
bathers,  and  then,  after  lunch,  sitting  on  the  hotel  piazza,  reading  a 
Quarterly  Review,  and  glancing  up  from  time  to  time  to  watch  the 
waters  and  the  passing  ships,  while  the  ocean  breeze  tossed  his  silvery 
hair  and  beard,  and  freshened  the  healthful  tint  of  his  cheek.  Then 
he  would  stroll  a  while  along  the  promenade,  talking  to  his  chosen 
companion,  and  often  repeating  some  of  the  poems  that  he  loved, 
familiar  to  us  all  from  his  lips. 

"  I  see  his  gray  eyes  twinkle  yet 

At  his  own  jest — gray  eyes  lit  up 
Wirh  summer  lightnings  of  a  soul 

So  full  of  summer  warmth,  so  glad, 
So  healthy,  sound  and  clear  and  whole,  ■ 

His  memory  scarce  can  make  me  sad." 

On  the  I  St  of  August  father's  nerves  were  shocked  by  an  acci- 
dent to  his  wife,  who  injured  one  of  her  eyes  severely.  At  first  it 
improved  rapidly  under  treatment,  but  was  then  neglected  and  she 
suffered  much  in  consequence.  Father's  anxiety  may  have  short- 
ened his  life  ;  it  is  certain  that  it  weighed  him  down.  He  had  grown 
to  depend  upon  her  eyes  and  voice  in  reading  and  writing  for  him, 
and  upon  her  ever  ready  companionship.  They  went  to  Saratoga  on 
the  nth,  and  there  her  suffering  became  so  great  that  they  called 
in  the  oculist,  Dr.  Webster,  who  happened  to  be  staying  in  the  same 
hotel.  He  found  conditions  requiring  a  darkened  room,  a  trained 
nurse  to  make  constant  applications,  and  also  surgical  treatment  to 
break  up  adhesions  that  had  formed.  They  returned  to  New  York 
on  the  29th  of  August,  Mrs.  Wood  decidedly  better,  but  father  wrote 
on  the  30th  :  "  It  is  curious  that  I  should  be  so  much  more  depressed 
in  spirits  now,  than  when  L.  was  at  her  worst.  She,  I  am  thankful 
to  say,  is  really  the  more  cheerful  of  the  two,  but  I  am  better  in  the 


498  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

salubrious  air^of  my  adopted  city  than  I  was  at  Saratoga,  although  I 
must  say  the  air  there  is  delightful." 

The  oculist  who  had  treated  Mes.  Wood's  eyes  before  she  left 
New  York  was  Dr.  Noyes.  On  one  of  her  visits  to  him,  she  per- 
suaded my  father  to  have  his  eyes  examined.  Dr.  Noyes  found  that 
father  had  a  slight  cataract  on  the  right  eye,  but  that  the  left  was  in 
good  condition.  He  prescribed  distance  glasses,  as  well  as  those  my 
father  used  in  reading,  with  great  addition  to  his  comfort.  Mrs* 
Wood  left  him  on  September  10  for  a  few  days'  visit  to  friends  in 
Maine,  as  her  strength  was  not  returning  as  speedily  as  we  hoped. 
She  hastened  back,  however,  as  father  missed  her  so  much  as  to  add 
greatly  to  the  depression  of  spirits  and  loss  of  sleep  of  which  he 
which  he  now  often  complained.     On  September  13  he  wrote  to  me  : 

"  By  special  request  of  Dr.  Hunter,  I  went  up  to  the  Normal 
College  this  morning,  and  opened  it  by  reading  my  favorite  chapter, 
the  53d  of  Isaiah,  but  even  with  all  the  gas  lit,  and  the  sunshine 
of  a  clear  day,  I  stumbled  at  the  last  verse.  The  previous  part  I 
uttered  ore  rotundo,  but  this  is  really  the  last  time  I  shall  try  it. 

"  There  are  2006  students  on  the  register.  The  college  was  built 
for  1500.  No  man  in  the  world  but  Dr.  Hunter  could  draw  up  the 
programme  for  arranging  for  all  these  teachers  and  pupils.  Before  I 
left.  President  Knox  and  his  pretty  wife  came  in.  They  have  been 
to  California  this  summer.  Mrs.  Knox  is  a  colleague  of  Nellie's  in 
the  Home  for  the  Friendless,  and  spoke  highly  of  her,  as  she  well 
might. 

"  I  feel  my  wife's  absence  deeply,  even  with  my  two  dear  daugh- 
ters to  comfort  me.  The  shock  I  got  at  Saratoga  completely  un- 
nerved me,  and  I  have  not  got  over  it  yet,  although  I  am  better  on 
the  whole.     Pray  for  me. 

"  September  20.  At  the  latter  end  of  October,  or  any  time  most 
convenient  to  you,  we  shall  be  most  delighted  to  see  you. 

"  Well,  I  have  called  in  Dr.  Swasey  again,  and  he  has  put  me  on 
another  tonic. 

"  I  am  wishing  to  put  off  the  printing  of  the  250  pp.  of  the 
first  of  my  '  auto.,'  till  after  my  death,  as  originally  intended,  until 
you  suggested  printing  it  while  I  am  alive.  Now  I  have  a  '  scunner  ' 
at  the  whole  thing,  and  don't  wish  it  printed,  but  L.  does.     She  had 


CONTINUATION   BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D,    KANE.  499 

Mr.  Babcock  the  publisher  here  this  morning  on  the  subject.     I  am 
absolutely  sick  of  myself." 

Father's  interest  in  all  around  him  was  still  great,  but  his  hold 
on  life  was  loosening.  The  Father  whom  he  had  served  and  trusted 
so  long  was  quieting  him  to  his  rest  like  a  tired  child. 

"September  27,  1894. 
"  My  Darling  Bessie  : 

"  Yours  of  the  23d  inst.  reached  me  on  25th  idem. 
"  My  improvement  in  health  is  slow  and  irregular,  with  a  tendency 
to  insomnia  beginning  a  2  or  3  A.  M.  and  continuing  till  I  rise  at  five, 
and  my  depression  of  spirits,  though  less,  has  not  gone.  The  de- 
pression is  the  result  of  shock  after  L.'s  severe  illness,  coupled  with 
the  dreadfully  hot  and  damp  summer  and  fall  that  we  have  had. 

"  On  Monday  mormng  I  went  to  the  Nor  nal  College,  and  saw  the 
two  thousand  young  women  assembled.  On  Tuesday  I  went  to  the 
College  of  the  City  of  New  York  and  was  kindly  welcomed  by  Gen- 
eral Webb  and  the  new  professor.  Hardy — the  successor  of  Scott, 
and  known  to  me  for  the  last  eight  years. 

"  I  am  so  sorry  to  hear  that  the  youngest  of  the  race  is  suffering 
from  four  incoming  teeth.  The  beginning  and  the  end — the  last  sad 
scene  of  all  that  closes  this  strange  eventful  history — are  not  pleasant^ 
"  Yesterday  L.  and  I  spent  four  mortal  hours  at  the  Stock  Ex- 
change vault,  cutting  coupons  for  three  hours,  and  for  one  hour 
seeking  for  Aunt  Helen's  will,  which  we  did  not  find  then.  We 
found  it  to-day  in  my  safe  up  here. 

"  I  am  going  to  hand  over  her  affairs  to  J.  Walter,  as  I   feel  that 

when  a  man  is  on  the  verge  of  eighty-six  his  time  can't  be  very  long. 

"  Helen  and  little  Sabina  have  gone  on  a  visit  to  Walter  to-day. 

I   wish  the   former  were  back,  but  she  has  a  bad  cold,  which  the 

change  of  air  may  break  up. 

"  L.  and  I  did  too  much  yesterday,  and  I  suppose  suffer  from 
reaction  to-day. 

"  God  bless  you  and  yours.  You  have  been  a  most  kind  and 
dutiful  daughter  all  your  life  to  me.  The  Lord  bless  thee,  the  Lord 
keep  thee  and  thine. 

"  Ever  your  affectionate  father, 

"  William  Wood." 


500  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

These  were  his  last  farewell  words  to  me.  The  next  day,  Friday, 
September  28,  he  seemed  quite  well,  and  accompanied  his  wife  to 
visit  he  mother,  Mrs.  Mason.  Mrs.  Mason  was  in  ill-health  and  her 
daughter  was  compelled  to  divide  her  time  between  her  two  beloved 
ones.  When  she  was  absent  on  her  daily  visits  to  her  mother,  and 
during  her  short  absence  in   Maine,  my  two  sisters  took  her  place. 

On  Saturday,  September  29,  father  walked,  as  had  become  custom- 
ary with  him,  from  his  own  house  as  far  as  tlie  Twenty-ninth  Street 
Dutch  Reformed  Church.  The  distance  and  the  return  home  just 
made  a  mile,  which  he  would  walk  in  the  morning,  and  another 
mile  in  the  afternoon,  if  he  had  no  special  object  to  visit.  On 
returning  he  felt  some  pain.  Dr.  Swasey  had  been  asked  by  Mrs. 
Wood  to  see  him  once  a  week,  and  Saturday  being  his  regular  time 
for  coming,  he  was  able  to  relieve  him  without  difficulty,  but  to 
father's  chagrin  insisted  on  his  resting  through  the  remainder  of  the 
day  in  his  room.  He  explained  that  he  must  go  down  at  dinner- 
time to  sign  some  papers  and  draw  his  checks  for  monthly  pay- 
ments, and  remarked  that  there  were  certain  business  arrangements 
to  which  he  must  attend  on  Monday.  To  this  the  doctor  saw  no 
objection. 

When  Mrs.  Wood  went  to  accompany  her  mother  on  her  after- 
noon drive  Harriet  went  to  father's  room  to  sit  with  him.  She 
wrote  me  : 

"  He  was  lying  on  the  couch  in  the  dark  silk  dressing-gown  that 
L.  presented  him  with,  and  I  thought  how  uncommonly  handsome 
he  looked. 

"  '  Shall  I  read  some  more  of  "  Vanity  Fair  "  to  you  ?  '  I  asked. 

" '  No,  Harry  ;  much  as  I  love  dear  old  Thackeray  and  like  his 
writings,  when  one  comes  near  the  end  he  wants  something  dif- 
ferent.' 

"  '  What  would  you  like,  then  ? ' 

"  '  Suppose  you  read  Keble's  "  Christian  Year," — the  "  Morning  " 
and  "  Evening."  ' 

"  So  I  read,  and  the  dear  fellow  listened  attentively.  '  That  is 
beautiful,'  he  said  when  I  had  finished. 

"  I  then  took  up  a  book  that  we  had  been  reading  together, 
'Reminiscences  of  Irish  Life.'     He   laughed  over  the  jokes,^slept 


CONTINUATION   BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  50I 

and  woke  again,  declaring  that  he  had  heard  every  word.  Then, 
after  a  little  interval,  he  took  my  hand  and  repeated  slowly  one  of 
his  favorite  hymns,  beginning 

"  'Oh,  for  a  closer  walk  with  God.' 

"Then  springing  up  quickly  he  said,  'It's  too  bad  !  I  have  been 
kept  here  too  long.     I  must  go  to  my  accounts.     Come  along.' 

"  So  he  hurriedly  changed  his  coat  and  went  down  to  work  in 
his  library.  . 

"  He  was  very  cheerful  at  dinner  and  chanted  a  verse  of  a  Scotch 
song  to  show  Henry  Green  how  the  accent  fell.  Twice,  as  I  ex- 
tended my  hand,  he  pressed  it  kindly  in  his.  After  dinner  he  sat 
in  his  usual  corner  of  the  sofa,  leaning  back,  and  I  seated  myself 
near  him,  stroking  his  head,  and  we  vied  with  each  other  in  reciting 
his  pet  verses  and  hymns.     He  repeated  the  whole  of  Moore's 

"  '  Awake,  arise,  thy  light  is  come.' 

Then  I  began  singing  in  alow  voice,  and  he  joined  with  me  in  a 
number  of  pieces.  '  Dear  old  Harry,'  he  laughingly  concluded  our 
concert  by  saying,  'you  sing  all  your  hymns  and  songs  to  the  same 
tune  !  ' 

"  He  went  upstairs  at  nine  o'clock,  still  in  the  same  happy 
mood." 

On  Sunday,  the  30th,  he  rose  as  usual  at  five  o'clock,  bathed,  and 
returning  to  his  room  remarked  on  the  refreshment  the  bath  had 
given  him.  Before  breakfast  time,  however,  he  complained  of  some 
pain,  and  of  a  sudden  sense  of  weakness.  He  usually  read  aloud  to 
his  wife  the  two  chapters,  one  in  the  Old  and  one  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment, which  he  afterward  read  at  family  prayers.  On  this  occasion 
he  only  read  one.  I  find  noted  in  his  own  handwriting,  though 
penciled  in  tremulous  characters,  at  the  end  of  the  month's  list 
which  he  kept  between  the  leaves  of  his  Bible,  "  September  30, 
Hebrews,  8th  chapter." 

Mrs.  Wood  slipped  out  of  the  room  and  told  the  servant  not  to 
ring  the  bell  for  prayers  and  to  bring  breakfast  for  both  of  them  to 
his  room.  He  enjoyed  having  the  meal  alone  with  her,  though  he 
protested  against  a  self-indulgence  entirely  unusual  to  him.      He  had 


502  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

spurned  the  idea  that  he  was  not  strong  enough  to  walk  to  church 
as  usual,  but  he  now  yielded  to  his  wife's  persuasion  to  remain  at 
home.  A  little  after  ten  he  had  a  chill,  but  he  laughed  at  his  wife's 
being  alarmed  and  sending  for  Dr.  Swasey.  The  doctor  said  that 
the  chill  was  a  nervous  one,  but  that  he  wished  Mr.  Wood  to  be  very 
quiet  all  day,  and  to  go  to  bed  to  insure  it.  Somewhat  to  Mrs. 
Wood's  surprise,  he  yielded  a  ready  consent,  and,  by  the  physician's 
desire,  his  wife  alone  remained  with  him  after  Harriet  had  kissed 
him  farewell  and  gone  to  churcli.  All  day  he  rested  quietly,  sleep- 
ing or  waking,  cheerful  and  serene,  wanting  nothing  but  his 
wife's  companionship,  and  suffering  no  pain.  At  four  in  the  after- 
noon the  doctor  came  again  and  found  him  doing  well.  But  at  half- 
past  eight  in  the  evening  he  had  another  chill,  and  although  no  alarm 
was  felt,  the  doctor  was  summoned.  He  was  out,  and  when  he  came 
at  half-past  ten  he  at  once  asked  to  have  Dr.  Austin  Flint  sum- 
moned in  consultation,  saying  that  sleep  had  passed  into  uncon- 
sciousness. 

Mrs.  Watts  and  my  brother  Walter  were  at  once  summoned  by 
telephone,  and  as  there  were  no  Sunday  trains  running,  they  drove 
in  from  South  Orange,  reaching  Eighteenth  Street  about  2.30 
o'clock  A.  M.  Our  father  lay  peacefully  sleeping  his  life  away 
with  his  nearest  and  dearest  beside  him.  He  suffered  no  pain,  and 
passed  from  death  into  life  so  quietly  that  they  hardly  knew  that  he 
departed  at  seven  in  the  morning  of  Monday,  October  i. 

The  doctors  pronounced  the  proximate  cause  of  death  to  be 
uraemia,  but  the  preceding  passages  from  his  letters  which  I  have 
transcribed  show  that  the  full  term  of  life  had  been  reached.  With- 
out any  disease,  bodily  or  mental,  like  the  patriarchs  of  old,  "  being 
of  full  age  he  died  and  was  gathered  to  his  people." 

"  His  heart  was  tired,  tired, 
And  now  peace  laps  liim  round." 

My  brothers  Dennistoun,  Duncan,  and  Chalmers  were  able  to 
come  at  once,  but  I  only  reached  New  York  on  Tuesday,  and  took 
my  place  with  those  he  loved  in  watching  beside  the  couch  on  which 
the  dear  form  lay.  His  room  was  filled  with  flowers  and  his  chil- 
dren and  children's  children  came  and  went,  taking  their  last  fare- 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  503 

well;  but  there  was  sometliing  in  the  peaceful  sweetness  of  his  re- 
poseful face  that  stilled  grief.  In  that  room,  during  those  few  days 
before  the  funeral  should  close  the  old  household  life  and  the  new 
cares  and  anxieties  of  the  severed  family  links  begin,  we  paused  to  rest, 
and  though  parting  with  all  the  beloved  past,  we'tasted  "  the  peace 
that  passeth  understanding."  The  family  prayer  service  took  place 
as  usual,  though  another  voice  ministered  to  us,  but  we  knew  that 
he  would  have  liked  us  to  be  kneeling  round  him  still. 

As  the  manner  of  his  death  was  such  as  he  had  prayed  for,  so  all 
things  that  would  have  gratified  him  attended  his  passing  away.  He 
had  fancied  that  he  had  lived  so  long  that  he  would  be  forgotten 
in  the  scene  of  his  labors  when  he  came  to  die.  But  on  the  day  of 
his  funeral,  Thursday,  October  4,  the  Normal  College  and  the  Col- 
lege of  the  City  of  New  York  were  closed,  and  the  flags  on  all  the 
public  schools  hung  at  half-mast.  The  professors  of  the  colleges 
and  the  alumncC  of  his  peculiarly  beloved  Normal  College  gathered 
in  the  Twenty-ninth  Street  Church,  as  well  as  the  members  of  the 
Board  of  Education  and  of  the  St.  Andrew's  Society,  to  do  him 
honor.  And  of  all  the  flowers  heaped  about  the  chancel  the  most 
prized  by  those  who  loved  him  were  the  wreaths  entwined  with  the 
college  ivy  and  the  Scotch  thistle,  for  which  public  greenhouses  had 
been  ransacked  in  vain,  but  which  loving  search  had  gathered  from 
near  and  far,  knowing  how  he  prized  the  emblem  of  his  native  land. 

The  funeral  services  were  very  simple.  In  his  own  Dutch  Re- 
formed Church  the  ministers,  Drs.  Burrell  and  Hurlburt,  read  and 
prayed.  The  hymns  that  were  sung  he  had  himself  selected  long 
before: 

"  Approach,  my  soul,  the  mercy  seat, 
Where  Jesus  answers  prayer, 
There  humbly  fall  before  His  feet, 
For  none  can  perish  there." 
And 

"  Jesu,  the  very  thought  of  thee 
With  sweetness  fills  the  breast ; 
But  sweeter  far  Thy  face  to  see. 
And  in  Thy  presence  rest." 

And  the  favorite  of  everyone  since  Newman  wrote  it  in  1833  : 

"  Lead,  kindly  Light,  amid  the  encircling  gloom."  : 


504  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

The  rain  was  falling  drearily  as  we  drove  out  to  Greenwood,  but 
ceased  for  a  little  while  as  Dr.  Huntington  read  the  Episcopal 
funeral  service  at  the  grave.  Then  the  friends  that  had  come  with 
us  left,  but  father's  own  family  stayed  until  the  last  sod  was  placed, 
and  before  leaving  joined  with  trembling  voices  in  the  hymn 
beginning  : 

"  Sun  of  my  soul,  thou  .Saviour  dear, 
It  is  not  dark  if  thou  be  near.  " 

The  next  day  a  few  of  us  rode  out  to  Greenwood.  The  storm 
was  over,  and  the  flowers  heaped  on  his  grave,  on  Ocean  Hill,  were 
fresh  and  sweet  from  the  past  rain.  The  view  he  loved  so  much  lay 
stretched  beneath  our  feet  looking  over  the  outskirts  of  Brooklyn, 
over  field  and  farm,  the  sparkle  of  the  waters  of  the  bay,  the  fairy 
outline  of  the  Crow's  Nest  Tower  near  Manhattan  Beach,  and 
beyond,  a  glimpse  of  the  ocean.     I  was  reminded  of  the  lines, 

"Calm  and  still  light  on  yon  great  plain, 
That  sweeps  with  all  its  autumn  bowers 
And  crowded  farms  and  lessening  towers 
To  mingle  with  the  bounding  main." 

And  SO  we  left  his  body  to  rest  until  the   grave  gives  up  its  dead. 

"  I  heard  a  voice  from  heaven  saying  unto  me,  '  Write — Blessed 
are  the  dead  which  die  in  the  Lord  from  henceforth  ;  yea,  saith  the 
Spirit,  that  they  may  rest  from  their  labours  ;  and  their  works  do 
follow  them.'  " 

The  inscription  on  father's  monument  reads  : 

William  Wood, 
Born  in  Glasgow,  Oct.  2ist,  1808, 
Died  in  New  York,  Oct.   ist,  1894. 

"  Passed  from  Death  unto    Life." 

"  Gather  my  Saints  together  unto  Me." 

From  the  resolutions  passed  by  various  societies,  and  the  many 
obituary  notices  in  the  newspapers,  I  select  a  few  for   preservation, 


CONTINUATION   BY   MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.    KANE.  505 

knowing  that  father  would  have  liked  them  to  be  handed  down  by 
his  children  to  theirs. 

The  following  resolutions,  exquisitely  engrossed,  with  an  ornamen- 
tation of  ivy  leaves  and  thistles  in  their  natural  colors,  and  with 
initial  letterings  in  the  college  purple,  were  sent  to  Mrs.  Wood  by 
the  professors  and  instructors  of  the  Normal  College.  The  parch- 
ment was  mounted  on  rollers,  and  inclosed  in  a  handsome  box  of 
quartered  oak,  so  that  she  might  carry  it  abroad  with  her,  on  her 
intended  journey  to  her  friends  in  Europe. 

"  Resolutions  passed  by  the  president,  professors,  and  instructors  of 
the  Normal  College  : 

"  Whereas,  by  the  decree  of  divine  Providence,  Mr.  William 
Wood  has  been  taken  from  us  after  a  life  full  of  years  and  good 
works, 

"Whereas,  in  all  private  and  public  relations,  he  proved  to  be  a 
man  of  broad  mind,  tender  heart,  sterling  integrity,  and  rare  courage, 
realizing  the  noblest  type  of  manhood,  and, 

"  Whereas,  by  the  prominent  part  he  took  in  founding  the  Normal 
College  by  his  valuable  services  as  school  commissioner,  chairman  of 
the  committee  on  Normal  College,  and  president  of  the  Board  of 
Education,  he  endeared  himself  to  us  as  the  champion  of  lower  and 
higher  education,  and  the  benefactor  of  both  teachers  and  students  ; 

^''Resolved,  That  we,  president,  professors,  and  instructors  of  the 
Normal  College,  deplore  his  loss  as  that  of  the  kindest  friend,  always 
ready  to  espouse  a  good  cause,  and  fight  for  it  unselfishly  and  fear- 
lessly ; 

''''  Resolved /^\\dX  we  shall  always  miss  his  stately  figure,  cheering 
presence,  and  gracious  speech,  and  preserve  the  remembrance  of  the 
manly  virtues  for  which  we  honored,  admired,  and  loved  him,  and 

^''Resolved,  That  we  respectfully  extend  to  the  members  of  his 
bereaved  family  our  sincere  and  tender  sympathy,  and  that  a  copy 
of  these  preambles  and  resolutions  be  presented  to  them  as  a  slight 
tribute  of  regret,  reverence,  and  gratitude  to  the  memory  of  our 
departed  good  friend. 

"Thomas  Hunter, 

"  President  Normal  College." 


5o6  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

From  the  Normal  College  -Echo. 

"  THE    MEMORIAL    SERVICE. 

"  It  is  the  instinct  of  men  and  women,  where  one  passes  away  who 
was  dear  to  them,  to  recall  his  every  feature,  every  trait  or  mark  of 
individuality.  These  are  the  things  by  which  we  know  Mr.  Wood, 
for  which  we  honored  him,  through  which  his  nobility  was  made 
manifest  to  us.  Let  us  deepen  the  impression  these  made  upon  us, 
that  his  influence  may  not  pass  away,  nor  the  work  he  did  vanish 
with  time.  It  is  the  call  of  Memory  to  us  to  help  her  preserve  that 
which  she  holds  in  trust  for  our  soul.  It  is  the  heart's  desire  to  keep 
his  presence  living  which  asks  of  us  words  to  embody  those  qualities 
which  before  needed  no  speech  to  make  them  visible. 

"  There  is  no  need  to  go  over  in  detail  the  loving  tribute  paid  to 
Mr.  Wood  by  the  former  students  of  the  college  which  was  the  child 
of  his  effort. 

"President  Hunter  spoke  of  him  as  only  so  intimate  and  dear  a 
friend  could.  The  incidents  were  many  of  them  new  to  us,  but  the 
main  idea  which  flowed  through  them — the  strength,  nobility  and 
beauty  which  characterized  the  man  of  whom  these  things  were  told 
— was  only  deepened  and  impressed. 

"  One  thing,  however,  is  worthy  of  notice  :  all  of  us  knew  how 
stanch  a  friend  Mr.  Wood  was  to  the  college.  But  it  is  doubtful  if 
many  of  us  knew  how  great  was  the  debt  the  Normal  College  owed 
him — that  of  very  existence. 

"  After  President  Hunter  had  spoken  there  were  read  the  resolu- 
tions of  the  Wood  Memorial  Committee.  However  inadequate  all 
such  expressions  may  be,  it  is  at  least  fitting  that  some  form  should 
be  given  to  our  thoughts,  when,  from  the  circumstance  of  our  num- 
bers, individual  expression  becomes  an  impossibility. 

"Of  the  tribute  of  song  our  poet  brought,  one  can  but  say  that  its 
high  words  and  uplifting  thought  seemed  fitly  upborne  upon  the 
memory  of  him  of  whom  it  spoke,  and  that  its  tone  of  undaunted 
hope,  and  the  words  which  dwelt  upon  him  as  we  knew  him,  will 
stay  with  us  for  an  abiding  symbol. 

"  Mr.  Wood  was  so  often  with  us  at  Alumnae  meetings  that  it 
seemed  as   if  it  might   be  his  voice  that  spoke  through  his  son.     At 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  507 

least  we  know  that  his  voice  will  be  with  us  always  and  will  give  us 
hope  and  strength,  courage  and  inspiration.  May  we  never  .lose 
that  strain — the  melody  his  life  embodied — nor  fail  in  due  reverence 
and  love  for  truth  and  honor  such  as  his  !  " 

Mrs.  Wood  was  deeply  touched  by  receiving  a  beautifully  illumi- 
nated copy  of  the  following  : 

"  Resolutions  passed  at  the  meeting  of  October  27  : 

"  We,  the  Associated  Alumnae  of  the  Normal  College  of  the  City 
of  New  York,  assembled  and  met  together  to  honor  the  memory  of 
our  beloved  benefactor,  William  Wood,  do  hereby 

^'Resolve,  That  in  Mr.  Wood  the  common  schools  of  our  city  have 
lost  a  strong  and  steadfast  supporter,  the  higher  education  of  women 
a  keen  and  chivalrous  champion,  our  alma  mater  an  ardent  and 
untiring  advocate,  and  our  association  a  generous  and  faithful 
friend. 

"  Be  it  resolved.  That  the  students  of  the  Normal  College,  from 
the  day  of  its  founding  to  the  day  of  his  death,  derived  inspiration 
from  his  noble  presence  and  ever  gracious  words,  and  recognized  in 
him,  with  gratitude,  the  projector  and  defender  of  the  institution  to 
which  they  owed  so  much. 

"  ^<f  it  resolved,  That  we  offer  to  the  family  of  our  dear  friend 
our  deepest  sympathy,  now  that  the  long  and  beautiful  day  of  his 
earthly  life  is  ended,  and  at  the  hour  of  '  twilight  and  evening  star  ' 
the  tide  '  which  drew  from  out  the  boundless  deep '  has  turned  again 
'to  God,  who  is  our  home.' 

"  Be  it  resolved.  That  these  resolutions  be  signed  by  the  President 
and  other  officers  of  the  Associate  Alumnae,  and  the  Wood  Memorial 
Committee." 

Resolutions  passed  by  the  students  of  the  Normal  College  of  the 
City  of  New  York,  October  3,  1894,  upon  the  occasion  of  the  death 
of  the  Hon.  William  Wood  : 

"  Whereas,  Our  Heavenly  Father  in  His  infinite  wisdom  has  taken 
from  us  our  benefactor  and  friend,  the  Hon.  William  Wood, 

^''Resolved,  That  we,  the  students  of  the  Normal  College,  do  here- 


508  AUTOBIOGRAPHY   OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

by  tender  to  his  bereaved  family  our  deepest  and  most  sincere  sym- 
pathy. 

"  Resolved,  That  we  most  gratefully  recognize  our  indebtedness  to 
him  for  his  unequaled  efforts  and  share  in  the  founding  of  the  Nor- 
mal College. 

''''Resolved,  That  his  noble  character  and  life,  as  well  as  his  never- 
failing  interest  in  our  welfare,  and  his  hearty  co-operation  in  our 
work  have  so  endeared  him  to  us  that  he  will  forever  live  in  our 
memory. 

"  Resolved,  That  in  his  death  the  college  has  been  deprived  of  a 
stanch  and  loyal  friend,  whose  place  we  feel  can  never  be  filled. 

'''Resolved,  That  a  copy  of  these  resolutions  be  drawn  up  and  pre- 
sented to  his  afflicted  family. 

"  Edith  Patterson,  '95, 

"  Edith  Livermore,  '95, 

"  In  behalf  of  the  Normal  College  students." 

"  118  East  Sixty-Second  Street, 

"  New  York,  January  7,  1895. 
"Mrs.  \Vm.  Wood. 

"  Dear  Madam  :  As  chairman  of  the  Wood  Memorial  Commit- 
tee, I  beg  to  inform  you,  that  at  the  last  meeting  of  the  joint  com- 
mittees of  tlie  Normal  College  and  the  Associate  Alumnae,  the  artist 
was  selected  who  shall  execute  the  bust  in  bronze  of  our  noble  and 
regretted  friend,  Mr.  W.  Wood. 

"  The  artist  intrusted  with  the  work  is  Mr.  W.  Ordway  Partridge, 
and  we  have  every  reason  to  believe  that  he  will  produce  a  satisfac- 
tory likeness  and  an  enduring  work  of  art. 
"  I  am,  dear  madam,  with  profound  respect, 

"  Your  sincere  and  obedient  servant, 

"  E.    AUBERT." 
"ex-president    wood's    DEATH. 

"  The  death  of  William  Wood  was  announced  and  resolutions  of 
regret  were  presented  by  Commissioner  Guggenheimer.  Dr.  Hunt 
also  moved  that  the  schools  be  closed  in  memory  of  Mr.  Wood,  as  a 
proper  tribute  to  him  and  an  object  lesson  that  would  be  of  value  to 
the  pupils.     Mr.   Strauss,  Mr.  Harris,  Mr.  Maclay,  and  other  mem- 


CONTINUATION    BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH    D.    KANE.  509 

bers  objected  to  the  precedent  afforded  by  such  action,  and  after 
discussion  it  was  ordered  that  the  flags  should  be  placed  at  half- 
mast  on  every  school  building,  as  a  tribute  to  Mr.  Wood's  memory. 
This  was  adopted.     The  following  resolutions  were  approved  : 

"  IN    MEMORY    OF    WILLIAM    WOOD. 

"  Mr.  President : 

"  With  a  sense  of  public  loss — I  may  say  almost  of  personal  affec- 
tion— I  rise  to  make  formal  announcement  of  the  death  of  one  who 
was  for  many  years  a  member  of  this  board. 

"The  office  of  commissioner  of  common  schools  is  of  great 
dignity  and  honor  ;  its  duties,  powers,  and  responsibilities,  of  them- 
selves, make  it  such.  But,  Mr.  President,  I  think  I  may  say  without 
being  illogical  or  giving  way  too  much  to  sentiment  or  fancy,  that 
the  office  is  honorable  also  from  the  fact  that  so  many  upright,  able 
and  distinguished  men  have  accepted  and  held  it  ;  have,  within  these 
walls,  labored  and  spoken  for  the  public  schools  ;  have  occupied 
with  grace  and  power,  the  chair  which  you  now  so  ably  fill.  It  would 
be  a  long  list  were  I  to  go  back  ;  it  would  take  too  much  time  were 
I  to  mention  names  of  those  appearing  thereon,  and  dwell  even 
slightly  upon  their  characters,  labors,  and  success.  Of  one  of  them 
however,  we  must  speak  to-day. 

"  Some  twenty-five  years  ago  William  Wood  became  a  com- 
missioner of  common  schools  ;  and  from  that  period  of  time  he  may 
be  said  to  have  been  in  and  of  the  public  school  system  of  the  city 
of  New  York.  It  is  true  that  he  resigned  in  1888  ;  and  that  he  was 
not  continuously  a  commissioner  up  to  that  time  ;  but  if  continuous 
love  for  the  school  system,  if  uninterrupted  interest  in  its  welfare, — 
material  and  mental, — uninterrupted  affection  for  scholars  and  teach- 
ers, and  uninterrupted  association  with  the  Board  of  Education  as 
manifested  by  his  presence  at  its  important  meetings,  by  calls  at  this 
office  and  upon  the  city  superintendent,  and  by  visits  to  the  col- 
leges and  schools,  be  taken  into  consideration,  he  may  indeed  be 
said  to  have  been  connected  with  the  schools  from  the  time  of  his 
first  appointment  until  the  very  day  he  died. 

"  Mr.  Wood  was  exceptionally  well  qualified  to  be  a  commissioner 
of  common  schools.  A  college  graduate,  he  was  all  his  lifetime  a 
student  ;  as  a  banker  he  did  not  lose  his  interest  in  the  classics  ;  a 


5IO  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

man  of  affairs,  he  remained  always  devoted  to  letters  ;  a  close  thinker 
and  forcible  debater,  poetry  never  lost  for  him  its  charm.  He  was 
the  impersonation  of  attention  and  devotion  to  his  duties  as  com- 
missioner. As  member  of  the  board  and  its  committees,  and  as 
president,  it  is  almost  accurately  true  to  say  that  he  was  present  a^ 
every  meeting  during  his  long  term  of  service.  Recommending  and 
effecting  many  improvements,  he  will  be  best  known,  perhaps,  as  the 
friend,  if  not  the  founder,  of  the  Normal  College.  His  abilities,  wis- 
dom, and  labor  may  be  illustrated,  and  may,  perhaps,  be  measured  in 
part,  by  the  magnitude  and  success  of  that  institution,  in  the  estab- 
lishment of  which  he  labored  indefatigably,  and  over  which  he 
watched  with  affection  until  death  brought  his  earthly  career  to  a 
close.  A  man  of  profound  religious  convictions,  Mr.  Wood  knew 
not  illiberality,  and  throughout  his  long  career  he  displayed  the  mag- 
nanimity and  practiced  the  charity  which  make  the  whole  world  kin. 

"  His  simple,  childlike,  and  abiding  faith  was  one  of  his  most  lovely 
characteristics,  and  his  expression  thereof,  oftimes  made  in  the 
hearing  of  friends,  produced,  they  tell  me,  an  impression  as  sweet 
and  solemn  as  impression  made  by  preacher,  or  by  lesson  recorded 
in  any  book,  save  one. 

"  I  offer  for  adoption  the  following  resolutions  : 

"  'Resolved,  That  in  the  death  of  William  Wood,  for  many  years  a 
commissioner  of  common  schools,  and  for  four  years  President  of 
the  Board  of  Education,  the  community  loses  a  citizen,  eminent  and 
praiseworthy  in  his  every  walk  of  life  ;  the  Board  of  Education  one 
wliom  they  delighted  to  honor,  and  whose  memory  they  will  pre- 
serve, and  the  school  system  of  this  city  a  friend  who  labored  for 
many  years  earnestly  in  its  behalf,  and  who  loved  it  to  the  last. 

^'''^ Resolved,  That  this  board  hereby  expresses  its  sincere  sympathy 
with  the  family  of  the  deceased  ;  and 

"  'Resolved,  That  this  board,  in  a  body,  attend  the  funeral  services.'  " 

The  following  were  the  resolutions  presented  by  Commissioner 
Guggenheimer  and  adopted  by  the  Normal  College  Trustees  on  the 
death  of  the  late^William  Wood  : 

"  Whereas,  It  has  pleased  Almighty  God  to  remove  from  our 
midst,  in  the  fullness  of  years,  our  beloved  friend   and   former  asso- 


CONTINUATION   BY    MRS.    ELIZABETH   D.    KANE.     *    511 

ciate,  the  Hon.  William  Wood,  who  was  a  commissioner  of 
common  schools  for  nineteen  years,  for  four  years  President  of  the 
Board  of  Education,  and  for  ten  years  chairman  of  the  Executive 
Committee  on  Normal  College  ;  and, 

"Whereas,  In  every  position  which  he  held,  he  endeared  himself 
to  his  colleagues,  by  the  courtesy  of  his  manners,  the  justice  of  his 
conduct  and  the  ability  he  manifested  in  the  performance  of  duty  ; 
therefore, 

"  Resolved,  That  in  the  death  of  the  Hon.  William  Wood  the 
common  schools  of  this  city  have  lost  a  devoted  friend  and  an 
able  advocate,  who  gave  freeely  and  lovingly  his  time,  his  labor,  and 
his  talents  to  advance  the  educational  system,  and  to  elevate  its 
teachers  to  a  higher  plane  of  usefulness. 

"  Resolved,  That  as  the  chief  originator  and  founder  of  the  Nor- 
mal College,  the  women  teachers  of  New  York  owe  him  an  immeas- 
ureable  debt  of  gratitude  ;  and  not  only  the  teachers,  but  women  of 
all  classes  are  deeply  indebted  to  him  for  his  unwearied  efforts  to 
secure  them  the  blessings  of  higher  education. 

''''Resolved,  That  this  board  and  the  Executive  Committee  on  Nor- 
mal College  consider  it  a  pleasure  as  well  as  a  duty  to  bear  testimony 
to  Mr.  Wood's  long,  able,  and  faithful  services  as  commissioner  ;  to 
his  urbanity  as  an  associate  ;  and  to  his  sense  of  justice  as  a 
presiding  officer. 

"  Resolved,  That  a  copy  of  this  preamble  and  these  resolutions 
be  forwarded  to  the  family  of  the  deceased." 

The  following  resolutions  were  adopted  by  the  faculty  of  the 
College  of  the  City  of  New  York  : 

''''Resolved,  That  the  faculty  of  the  College  of  the  City  of  New 
York  learn  with  deep  sorrow  of  the  death  of  the  Hon.  William 
Wood.  Not  only  has  the  city  of  New  York  sustained  the  loss  of  a 
distinguished  public  servant,  but  this  institution  has  been  deprived 
of  one  of  its  ablest  and  most  earnest  advocates  and  friends.  As  a 
trustee  of  this  college  and  for  several  terms  the  president  of  its 
Board  of  Trustees,  Mr.  Wood's  unselfish  devotion  to  the  cause  of 
higher  education,  and  his  untiring  labors  in  behalf  of  all  legis- 
lation that  tended  to  the  advancement  of  the  college  and  its  interests, 


512  AUTOBIOGRAPHY    OF   WILLIAM    WOOD. 

afforded  ample  evidence  of  the  zeal  and  faith  that  animated  him  in 
whatever  he  undertook. 

"  In  recognition  of  his  generous  labors  in  behalf  of  this  college 
and  in  appreciation  of  the  dignity,  courtesy,  and  judgment  which 
characterized  him  in  the  discharge  of  his  duties,  we  desire  to  record 
here  our  sorrow  at  our  great  loss. 

"  Resolved,  That  the  faculty  of  the  College  of  the  City  of  New 
York  tenders  to  his  bereaved  family  its  condolence  and  sympathy. 

^^  Resolved,  That  a  copy  of  these  resolutions  be  sent  to  the  family 
of  the  deceased  and  that  a  committee  of  the  faculty  attend  his 
funeral  services." 

Reprinted  in  School,  for  October  4,  1894  : 

"to   WILLIAM    WOOD,    LL.    D. 

"  On  the  loth   Anniversary  of  his  Birthday. 
'  In  years  long  past,  when  Youth's  elastic  feet, 
Were  wont  in  Scotia's  classic  halls  to  tread, 
And  thou  hadst  learned  the  story  to  repeat 
In  grand  old  epics  for  the  ages  spread — 
When  thou  hadst  climbed  the  heights,  and  overhead 
The  azure  bent — the  silver  clouds  belowr — 

E'en  then,  no  '  second  sight '  thy  fancy  led 
Upon  thy  path  so  pure  a  light  to  throw. 
Or  dream,  that  in  thy  three-score  years  and  ten 

The  golden  wedlock  of  thy  life  should  be 
In  our  New  World  to  live  thy  youth  again  ; 
With  heart  elastic  as  thy  step  to  go, 
And  in  the  path  of  Truth  thy  feet  have  trod 
To  win  young  spirits  bright  through  wisdom  up  to  God. 

"  Wm.  Oland  Bourne. 
"  October  21,  1878." 


APPENDIX. 


APPENDIX. 


{From  the  Atlantic  Monthly,  July,   1874.) 
SCOTTISH    BANKING. 

In  1695  William  Paterson,  born  in  1658  in  the  parish  of  Tinwald,  Dumfries- 
shire, established  the  first  bank  which  ever  existed  in  Scotland.  It  was  known  by 
the  name  of  the  Bank  of  Scotland.  The  capital  was  fixed  at  ;^ioo,ooo  sterling, 
but  of  this  sum  only  ;^30,ooo  was  subscribed,  and  such  was  the  poverty  of  the 
country  that  even  of  that  small  sum  the  larger  portion  came  from  London, 
Holland,  and  Hamburg.  William  Paterson  had  previously  organized  the  Bank  of 
England,  which  had  occupied  his  thought  for  many  years,  and  which  was  incorpo- 
rated by  royal  charter  July  27,  1694  ;  but  for  his  share  in  establishing  it,  so  far  as  I 
can  ascertain,  he  never  seems  to  have  received  any  reward  ;  and,  strange  to  say, 
from  that  day  to  this,  no  Scotsman  has  ever  been  allowed  by  our  "ancient  ene- 
mies of  England  "  to  be  governor  of  the  Bank  of  England,  although  Scotsmen  are 
not  by  law  excluded  from  its  direction,  as  Jews  and  Quakers  are.  The  nearest 
approach  to  having  a  Scotsman  as  governor  was  about  thirty-five  years  ago,  when 
Sir  John  Rae  Reid,  of  Reid,  Irving  &Co.,  the  son  of  a  Scotsman  born  in  England, 
attained,  if  I  remember  rightly,  that  high  financial  position.  About  the  same 
time  that  the  Bank  of  Scotland  was  established,  William  Paterson  was  actively 
engaged  in  promoting  his  scheme  for  colonization  of  the  Isthmus  of  Darien,  and 
such  an  enterprise  had  far  greater  charms  for  the  pcrferviduin  ingenhim  Scotorum 
than  the  sober  pursuits  of  banking  ;  for,  while  ^30,000  could  not  be  raised  in 
Scotland  for  banking,  ;^400, 000  sterling  were  subscribed  for  the  Darien  expedition  ! 
The  consequence  was  that  much  of  the  little  capital  of  Scotland  was  lost  in  tha 
disastrous  affair  ;  and  banking  facilities  seem  to  have  been  little  understood  or 
appreciated  for  very  many  years  afterward.  This  is  little  to  be  wondered  at  if  we 
consider  the  condition  of  Scotland  during  the  last  ten  years  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  as  portrayed  by  that  famous  Scottish  patriot,  Andrew  Fletcher  of  Saltoun, 
in  1698.  "  There  are,"  says  he,  "at  this  day  in  Scotland  200,000  begging  from 
door  to  door.  These  are  not  only  no  way  advantageous,  but  a  very  grievous  bur- 
den to  so  poor  a  country  ;  and  though  the  number  of  them  be,  perhaps,  double 
what  it  was  formerly,  by  reason  of  the  present  great  distress,  yet  in  all  times  there 
have  been  about  100,000  of  these  vagabonds,  who  have  lived  without  any  regard  or 
submission  either  to  the  laws  of  the  land  or   those  of   God   and   nature.     They  are 

515 


5l6  APPENDIX. 

not  only  a  most  unspeakable  oppression  to  poor  tenants  (who,  if  they  give  not 
bread  or  some  sort  of  provision  to  perhaps  forty  such  villains  in  one  day,  are  sure 
to  be  insulted  by  them),  but  they  rob  many  poor  people  who  live  in  houses  distant 
from  any  neighborhood.  In  years  of  plenty  many  thousands  of  them  meet  together 
in  mountains,  where  they  feast  and  riot  for  many  days,  and  at  country  weddings, 
markets,  burials,  and  other  like  public  occasions,  they  are  to  be  seen,  both  men  and 
women,  perpetually  drunk,  cursing,  blaspheming,  and  fighting  together."  It  is 
only  fair  to  the  Scottish  people  to  say  that  the  demoralization  described  by  Fletcher 
was  in  a  very  great  measure,  if  not  solely,  owing  to  the  anarchy  and  confusion  caused 
by  the  religious  persecutions  under  Charles  II.  and  James  II.,  from  1661  to  1688, 
and  the  unsettled  state  of  politics  in  Scotland  after  the  accession  of  William  III.  to 
the  English  throne,  while  it  was  as  yet  undetermined  whether  or  not  the  Scottish 
Parliament  would  accept  him  as  king  of  Scotland. 

The  total  population  of  Scotland  at  this  time  was  probably  not  over  950,000.  It 
was  estimated  at  1,050,000  in  1707,  at  the  union  with  England,  only  about  250,000 
in  excess  of  that  of  the  city  of  London  ;  and  down  to  the  present  day  the  whole 
population  of  Scotland  bears  much  the  same  proportion  to  the  population  of  that 
metropolis.  In  the  midst  of  a  population  of  about  950,000 — 200,000  of  which  were 
of  the  character  described  by  Fletcher  of  Saltoun — the  peaceful  pursuits  of  com- 
merce and  finance  could  have  little  place. 

In  1707  the  union  of  Scotland  with  England  was  consummated,  and  as  an 
equivalent  for  various  losses  sustained  by  Scotland,  especially  by  Paterson's  Darien 
scheme,  and  probably  by  way  of  smoothing  matters  with  the  recalcitrant  Scots,  the 
union  commissioners  recommended  that  ;^398, 085  los.  sterling  (the  balance  of  a 
long  debtor  and  creditor  account  between  the  two  kingdoms)  should  be  paid  in 
cash  to  the  Scottish  exchequer.  This  was  a  large  sum  to  be  received  by  the  poorer 
country,  though  hardly  equal  to  what  it  lost  by  the  Darien  expedition  alone,  and  it 
appears  to  have  had  but  small  effect  in  bettering  the  condition  of  the  people,  who 
were  still  to  suffer  from  the  political  disturbances  caused  by  the  rebellions  in 
favor  of  the  Stuarts,  of  1715  and  1745,  before  they  finally  settled  down  into 
quiescence. 

It  was  not  until  some  four  or  five  years  after  the  suppression  of  the  latter  rebel- 
lion that  Scottish  agriculture  and  commerce  took  that  start  which  has  resulted  in 
the  magnificent  development  of  both  which  we  behold  to-day. 

Meanwhile,  in  1727,  the  Royal  Bank  of  Scotland  had  been  established,  which 
was  followed  in  1746  by  the  British  Linen  Co.  Bank.  The  Bank  of  Scotland, 
established  in  1695  by  Paterson,  was  carried  on  under  a  special  act  of  the  Scottish 
Parliament  ;  the  Royal  Bank  and  the  British  Linen  Co.  were  chartered  banks  ;  and 
it  was  believed  that  in  all  three  the  shareholders  were  only  liable  for  the  amount  of 
tlieir  shares.  With  regard  to  the  last  two  this  is  now  deemed  to  be  a  mistake,  and 
the  shareholders  are  presumed  to  be  personally  liable  to  the  extent  of  their  whole 
fortunes,  and  it  is  matter  of  doubt  whether  the  shareholders  of  the  Bank  of  Scot- 
land are  not  so  also. 

It  was  so  late  as  1750  that  private  banks  began  to  be  established  in  Scotland,  and 
before  giving  some  details  regarding  them,  it   may  be  well  to  note   the  remarkable 


APPENDIX.  517 

difference  between  the  mercantile  classes  of  Scotland  and  those  of  England.  The 
former  sprung  from  the  younger  sons  of  lairds  ur  landed  gentry,  the  latter  worked 
their  way  up  from  the  laborers  and  yeomanry.  The  Glasgow  merchants  trading  to 
Virginia  and  the  West  Indies,  up  to  the  close  of  the  last  century,  used  to  appear 
upon  'Change  in  scarlet  cloaks,  as  indicative  of  their  aristocratic  position  ;  and  the 
family  of  the  Dunlops  of  Carmyle,  near  Glasgow,  had  a  whole  collection  of  these 
scarlet  cloaks  worn  by  their  ancestors,  which,  having  been  stowed  away  for  more 
than  half  a  century,  were  brought  forth  from  their  hiding-place  and  cut  up  into 
hoods  and  undergarments  for  the  Scottish  soldiers  in  leaguer  before  Sebastopol  in 
the  dreadful  winter  of  1855-56. 

From  the  time  of  the  establishment  of  the  Bank  of  England,  a  banking  firm  in 
England  could  not  consist  of  more  than  six  partners,  and  could  only  issue  notes 
outside  of  the  London  district.  There  was  no  such  restriction  as  to  the  number  of 
banking  partners  in  Scotland,  and  there  a  registry  office  for  the  registration  of  sales, 
transfers,  and  mortgages  of  land  existed,  while  in  England  there  was  nothing  of  the 
sort.  Therefore,  in  Scotland,  if  the  landed  gentry  became  partners  in  a  bank,  any 
change  in  their  holdings  was  at  once  known  by  an  inspection  of  the  books  of  the 
registry  office  ;  no  such  clew  was  afforded  to  the  condition  of  the  affairs  of  bankers 
in  England. 

The  Scottish  bankers,  from  the  very  origin  of  banking  in  their  own  country,  held 
a  high  social  position  ;  they  were  men  of  "mark  and  likelihood."  When  Andrew 
Drummond  of  Macheany — an  uncle  of  Viscount  Strathallan,  and  a  kinsman  of  the 
Duke  of  Perth,  who  after  1715  established  the  great  banking-house  of  Drummonds, 
49  Charing  Cross,  London,  as  it  was  surmised,  with  a  view  to  forwarding  the  inter- 
ests of  the  exiled  Stuarts — was  upbraided  by  some  of  his  aristocratic  kinsmen  for 
engaging  in  trade,  he  replied,  "  A  gentleman  may  be  a  banker,  though  it  by  no 
means  follows  that  every  banker  is  a  gentleman."  Fifty  or  sixty  years  after  his 
day,  it  was  almost  held  as  an  axiom  in  Scotland  that  every  banker  was,  ex  officio, 
a  gentleman.  Within  my  own  recollection,  bankers  in  Scotland  were  looked  upon 
as  a  sort  of  demi-gods,  only  to  be  approached  with  "  bated  breath  and  whispering 
humbleness";  but  with  all  this  there  was  a  very  kindly  feeling  between  them  and 
their  customers,  and  there  was  a  thorough  appreciation,  on  the  side  of  both,  of  the 
great  principle  expressed  in  the  modern  formula  of  "  mutuality  of  service."  The 
sphere  of  action  of  the  various  banks  was  comparatively  limited,  and  the  banker 
was  thoroughly  acquainted  with  the  business  and  social  habits  of  his  customers. 

The  origin  of  private  banks  in  Scotland  was  nearly  coincident  with  the  purchase 
by  the  government  of  the  "  herediary  jurisdictions,"  after  the  suppression  of  the 
rebellion  of  1745.  In  exchange  for  these  high,  but  invidious,  privileges,  which  had 
cast  a  blight  over  the  whole  country,  the  sum  of  about  ;^i 50,000  sterling  was 
awarded  to  the  Scottish  lairds  and  Highland  chiefs  holding  these  privileges  in  1748, 
and  so  the  hereditary  jurisdictions,  hitherto  instruments  of  oppres.sion  and  extortion 
when  represented  by  money,  were  turned  into  blessings  in  promoting  the  growth  of 
agriculture,  commerce,  and  manufactures.  Of  the  ^150,000  mentioned  above, 
;^2i, 000  were  awarded  to  the  Duke  of  Argyll,  ;^662i  to  the  Duke  of  Queensbury, 
down  to  the  smallest  sum  of  ^65  19s.  9d.  to  Sir  James  Lockhart  for  the  regality  of 


5l8  APPENDIX, 

Carstairs.  This  money  was  a  perfect  godsend  to  Scoiland,  wasted  as  it  was  by  the 
war  of  the  rebellion  ;  and,  as  it  was  derived  directly  from  the  result  of  that  rebellion, 
Scotland  may  be  said  literally  out  of  the  nettle  danger  to  have  plucked  the  flower 
safety. 

What  those  hereditary  jurisdictions  had  been,  it  may  be  well  to  explain.  The 
holders  of  them  had  the  power  of  "heading  and  hanging"  within  their  respective 
domains,  but  the  Scottish  lairds  and  Highland  chiefs  who  possessed  them  had  long 
anticipated  Jeremy  Bentham's  apothegm  that  "  The  worst  use  you  can  put  a  man  to 
is  to  hang  him."  Burton  says  in  his  History  of  Scotland  from  1698  to  1748  :  "  The 
authority  of  the  lairds  did  not  enable  them  to  transport  convicts,  but  when  the  gal- 
lows was  in  the  background,  they  had  little  difficulty  in  persuading  those  who  came 
under  their  wrath  that  it  would  be  well  not  to  be  clamorous,  but  submit  at  once  to 
the  alternative  of  entering  as  apprentices  in  one  of  the  American  plantations.  Some 
of  these  potentates  increased  their  scanty  incomes  by  prudently  turning  their  judicial 
powers  in  this  profitable  direction.  It  is  the  natural  effect  of  such  powers  as  those 
involved  in  the  hereditary  jurisdiction  that  they  exercise  a  tyrannical  influence 
beyond  their  strictly  legal  bounds."  Hence,  besides  convicts  exiled  as  stated  above, 
there  was  a  regular  trade  in  kidnaping  carried  on  in  Scotland  during  the  first  half 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  and  small  as  was  the  commerce  of  Scotland  at  that  time, 
it  was  deeply  stained  with  this  criminal  traffic  during  the  period  before  the  rebellion 
of  1745. 

So  little  demand,  however,  was  there  for  banking  accommodation  by  the  mer- 
chants of  the  commercial  metropolis  of  Scotland  in  the  last  part  of  the  seven- 
teenth and  earlier  portion  of  the  eighteenth  century,  that  the  Bank  of  Scotland, 
which  attempted  to  establish  a  branch  in  Glasgow  in  1696,  had  to  withdraw  it 
the  following  year  for  want  of  business  ;  they  tried  it  again  in  1731,  and  aban- 
doned it  in  1733  from  the  same  cause,  and  for  seventeen  years  afterward  Glasgow 
had  no  bank  whatever. 

In  1750  3-  few  wealthy  men  determined  to  establish  a  private  bank  in  that  city, 
and  in  the  early  part  of  the  year  the  Ship  B.ink  was  opened  ;  the  partners  were 
Colin  Dunlop,  and  Carmyle  ;  James  Dennistoun  of  Dennistoun  ;  Alexander 
Houston  of  Jordanhill  ;  William  Mac^owell  of  Castlesemple  ;  George  Oswald  of 
Scotston  ;  and  James  Simson,  merchant  ;  all  but  the  last,  it  will  be  seen,  lairds  or 
landed  proprietors.  This  was  followed  at  the  end  of  the  same  year  by  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  Glasgow  Arms  Bank,  and  about  the  same  time  was  established  in 
Edinburgh  the  private  bank  of  Sir  William  Forbes  &  Co.  The  founder  was  a  man 
of  ancient  lineage,  but  owing  to  the  forfeitures  for  the  rebellion  of  1745,  his  family 
was  reduced  to  very  narrow  circumstances.  His  father  died  when  he  was  very 
young,  predeceasing  the  grandfather  of  Sir  William,  and  therefore,  never  succeeding 
to  the  baronetcy.  Sir  William  was  brought  up  in  a  very  thrifty  manner  by  his 
mother,  who,  however,  educated  him  well  and  gave  him  literary  tastes,  so  that  after 
he  had  achieved  fame  and  fortune  as  a  banker,  he  wrote  a  life  of  Dr.  Beaitie,  the 
author  of  "  The  Minstrel,"  a  poem  in  some  repute  eighty  or  ninety  years  ago.  It 
is  of  him  that  Sir  Walter  Scott  writes  in  the  introduction  of  the  fourth  canto  of 
"  Marmion  ": 


APPENDIX.  519 

"Scarce  had  lamented  Forbes  paid 
The  tribute  to  his  minstrel's  shade. 
The  tale  of  friendship  scarce  was  told. 
Ere  the  narrator's  heart  was  cold." 

Which  I  take  the  opportunity  of  quoting,  to  show  that  the  Scottish  name  Forbes 
should  be  pronounced  as  a  dissyllalile,  instead  of  as  a  monosyllable,  as  it  always 
«rroneously  is  in  England  and  America. 

It  was  the  second  Sir  William  Forbes,  successor  of  his  father  in  the  management 
of  the  bank,  who  married  Miss  Belsher-Stewart,  of  Fettercairn,  the  first  love  of  Sir 
Walter  Scott,  a  match  which  did  not  interfere  with  the  warm  friendship  of  the 
gentlemen.  The  youngest  son  of  this  marriage,  James  David  Forbes,  was  the 
contestant  with  Agassiz  for  the  honor  of  first  discovering  the  glacier  theory. 

The  Scottish  banking  system  may,  then,  be  said  to  have  fairly  taken  root  in  1750. 
Before  that  time  it  was  a  very  sickly  plant,  showing  hardly  any  vitality,  but  after- 
ward "grew  and  waxed  a  great  tree,  and  the  fowls  of  the  air  lodged  in  the 
branches  of  it."  Private  banks  gradually  increased  in  Glasgow,  Paisley,  Ayr,  and 
Greenock  on  the  vilest  side  of  Scotland,  and  in  Edinburghj  Dundee,  and  Aberdeen 
on  the  east  side. 

The  last  private  bank  established  in  Glasgow  and,  I  believe,  in  Scotland,  was 
the  Glasgow  Bank,  established  in  May,  1809,  by  my  grandfather,  the  late  James 
Dennistoun  of  Golfhill.  Besides  himself  the  partners  were  sixteen  in  number, 
namely,  the  Right  Honorable  Lord  Kinnaird,  the  elder  brother  of  Byron's  friend, 
Douglas  Kinnaird — who,  by  the  way,  always  pronounced  the  poet's  name  as  we 
should  the  Irish  name  of  Byrne — John  Tennent,  Peter  Macadamy,  Robert  Blair, 
Robert  Brown,  William  Taylor,  all  merchants  of  Glasgow  ;  W.  B.  Cabbell,  Samuel 
Nicholson,  Thomas  Haydon,  William  Morland,  and  Henry  Boase,  merchants  in 
London  ;  Walter  Fergus,  merchant  in  Kirkcaldy  ;  John  Baxter  and  William 
Roberts,  merchants  m  Dundee  ;  Alexander  McGregor,  merchant,  Liverpool,  and 
John  Grundy,  Jr.,  woolen  manufacturer,  Bury,  Lancashire. 

It  is  worthy  of  remark  that  the  partnership  is  nearly  all  of  mercantile  men, 
instead  of  being  nearly  all  of  landed  proprietors,  as  that  of  the  first  private  bank 
established  in  Glasgow  was,  fifty-nine  years  before.  The  Glasgow  Bank  main- 
tained a  very  high  character  under  the  management  of  Mr.  Dennistoun  until  he 
retired  from  business  in  1829.  On  that  occasion  (December  2,  1829)  a  great  public 
dinner  was  given  to  him  at  the  opening  of  the  Glasgow  Royal  Exchange,  by  the 
magistrates  and  his  fellow-citizens,  in  testimony  of  their  respect  for  him,  not  only 
as  a  banker  but  as  a  man  of  most  liberal  political  views  and  principles.  He  was 
offered  a  baronetcy  by  Lord  Grey's  government  in  1832,  which  he  declined,  a  very 
unusual  thing  for  a  Scotsman  to  do.  The  Glasgow  Bank  became  finally  one  of 
the  numerous  private  banks  merged  in  the  Union  Bank  of  Scotland. 

The  basis  of  all  Scottish  banking,  from  its  real  commencement  with  the  establish- 
ment of  private  hanks  in  1750,  seems  to  have  been  : 

First.  The  receiving  and  keeping  of  one  person's  money  at  one  rate  of  interest, 
and  the  lending  of  it  to  another  person  at  a  higher  rate  of  interest,   generally  at  a 


520  APPENDIX. 

difference  of  two  or  two  and  a  half  per  cent,  per  annum  ;  the  capital  of  the  bank, 
and  the  unlimited  liability  of  the  partners,  forming  a  reserve  against  bad  debts. 

Second.  The  issuing  of  notes  payable  on  demand  and  the  keeping  of  the  same 
in  circulation  as  long  as  possible. 

Third.  The  keeping  very  considerable  reserves  in  London,  invested  in  such  a 
manner  as  to  enable  the  banker,  at  a  moment's  notice,  to  meet  any  demands  which 
may  be  made  upon  him. 

There  appears  to  have  been  no  particular  proportion  kept  between  the  reserve 
and  the  liabilities,  that  being  a  matter  regulated  by  the  prudence  of  the  partners  of 
the  individual  banks. 

Up  to  1845  notes  of  one  pound  and  upward  were  issued  by  the  various  Scottish 
banks  without  any  apparent  rule  as  to  the  proportion  between  the  issue  and  the  sum 
reserved  for  the  redemption  of  the  notes,  but  any  overissue  by  an  individual  bank 
was  efficiently  checked  by  the  clearance  in  Edinburgh,  twice  a  week,  of  each  bank 
with  every  other  bank.  So  that,  if  any  bank  were  too  eager  to  get  out  its  notes,  they 
were  speedily  returned  to  it  by  its  competitors,  and  the  excess  over  what  it  held  0/ 
the  notes  of  other  banks  had  to  be  settled  by  exchequer  bills  payable  in  London. 

Scotsmen  always  have  had  a  most  infantile  and  perfect  trust  in  the  notes  of  their 
own  banks,  with  little  or  no  consideration  as  to  the  standing  of  the  issuing  banks. 
A  "  note  "  with  them  was  a  convertible  term  for  one  pound  sterling,  and  it  could 
not  have  been  held  in  greater  respect  had  it  been  a  golden  sovereign.  In  fact,  of 
the  two,  the  note,  by  ninety-nine  resident  Scotsmen  out  of  one  hundred,  would 
have  been  preferred,  and  this  was  the  case  all  over  Scotland  ;  and  even  as  far  south 
as  York,  Scottish  banknotes  were  circulated  before  1844. 

The  Scottish  demand  banknotes  were  always  legally  convertible  into  coin,  except 
during  the  suspension  of  specie  payments  by  the  Bank  of  England  for  the  twenty- 
four  years  from  1797  till  1811  ;  but  I  well  recollect  that  if  any  English  bagman, 
who  had  come  down  to  Scotland  to  collect  accounts  for  his  masters  in  England, 
wished  to  convert  the  notes  he  received  into  gold,  to  carry  with  him  to  England, 
the  look  of  the  paying  teller  to  whom  he  made  the  unusual  and  unwelcome  propo- 
sition was  much  the  same  as  that  with  which  he  would  have  regarded  a  highwayman 
who  had  bidden  him,  with  a  pistol  at  his  head,  "  Stand  and  deliver  !  " 

In  1761,  when  silver  change  became  extremely  scarce,  as  it  continued  to  be  for 
sixty  years  afterward,  the  Glasgow  banks  for  a  time  issued  ten-shilling  notes  on  de- 
mand, but  temporarily  made  their  one-pound  and  five-pound  notes  payable  "  either 
on  demand,  or  six  months  after  presentation,  at  the  option  of  the  bank,  with  six 
months'  interest."  After  some  time  the  Edinburgh  banks,  which  had  a  great 
jealousy  of  the  Glasgow  banks,  had  sufficient  interest  with  the  government  of  the 
day  to  have  an  Act  of  Parliament  passed  prohibiting  the  optional  clause  in  the 
Glasgow  banknotes. 

Guinea  notes  were  originally  issued  by  the  Ship  Bank  of  Glasgow  about  1780, 
with  a  view  of  meeting,  to  some  extent,  the  difficulty  of  procuring  silver  change. 
Thus,  if  a  person  owed  £10  i8s.  sterling,  he  gave  his  creditor  eighteen  guinea-notes 
and  two  one-pound  notes,  and  never  a  sixpence  of  silver  passed  between  them. 

To  show  the  great  scarcity  of  silver  at  the  period  referred  to,   and  the  dislike  of 


APPENDIX.  521 

the  wealthy  Glasgow  banks  to  be  called  upon  even  for  the  smallest  sums  of  specie, 
the  following  anecdote  will  suffice  :  A  little  boy  was  sent  out  by  his  mother  to  get 
change  for  a  one-pound  note,  and  having  in  vain  tried  to  change  it  at  their  own 
baker's  and  grocer's,  and  at  various  other  shops,  he  went  and  presented  it  at  the 
Ship  Bank,  by  which  it  was  issued,  and  requested  change.  "What's  your  name, 
sir?"  asked  the  teller.  Being  told,  his  next  question  was,  "  Who  is  your  master?" 
The  boy  replied  he  had  none.  "  Who  told  you  to  come  here,  then  ?"  said  the  per- 
sistent inquisitor.  "  My  mother,"  replied  the  boy.  The  teller  then  gave  a 
"Humph  ! "  and  sullenly  doled  out  the  necessary  change.  When  silver  was  de- 
manded for  a  guinea  note  a  gold  guinea  was  frequently  handed  to  the  owner  of  the 
note,  the  teller  well  knowing  that  the  gold  was  not  wanted,  being  really  less  easily 
converted  into  silver  change  than  the  note  itself.  The  Glasgow  branch  of  the 
Royal  Bank  in  those  days  absolutely  refused  to  cash  the  molher  bank's  notes  in 
silver,  except  to  its  own  customers,  and  referred  strangers  asking  for  change  of 
these  notes  to  the  head  office  in  Edinburgh,  where  the  notes  were  issued  and 
domiciled. 

The  ten-shilling  banknotes  had  gone  out  of  existence  long  before  my  day,  but  I 
do  very  well  remember  that  after  I  had  finished  my  college  course  and  entered  the 
office  of  my  father's  firm,  James  and  Alexander  Dennistoun  of  Glasgow,  in  1827, 
the  payments  for  cotton  sold  by  the  house  were  not  made  by  check  on  the  bank  in 
favor  of  the  sellers  of  the  produce,  which  was  in  those  days  a  thing  unknown,  the 
banks  expecting  that  their  customers  would  draw  out  notes  by  checks  in  their  own 
favor,  and  pay  these  notes  to  those  to  whom  they  owed  money,  and  the  notes  so 
paid  were  not  of  the  five-pound  denomination,  which  were  unlikely  to  circulate  long, 
but  consisted  of  huge  bundles  of  greasy  one-pound  and  one-guinea  notes,  which 
might  be  paid  out  to  laborers  and  others  and  remain  in  circulation. 

A  peculi.ir  feature  of  Scottish  banking  is  the  granting  of  what  are  called  "  cash 
credits"  to  small  farmers  and  manufactuicrs.  These  cash  credits  are  not  generally 
for  large  amounts,  the  majority  of  tiiem  probably  for  sums  not  over  one  thousand 
pounds  sterling  ;  their  aggregate,  however,  may  amount  to  a  very  considerable 
sum.  They  are  granted  upon  the  security  of  the  per.-on  receiving  the  credit,  and  also 
of  two  other  persons  whose  circumstances  are  well  known  to  the  bank,  and  who 
produce,  before  such  cash  credit  can  be  granted,  evidence  of  their  sufficiency  as 
guarantors.  On  this  particular  sort  of  banking  business  there  has  been,  it  is 
understood,  very  liitle  loss  to  the  banks,  and  in  the  earlier  stages  of  Scottish  agri- 
culture and  manufacture  the  system  no  doubt  tended  greatly  to  develop  both.  In 
advancing  money  to  farmers  on  cash  credits  the  Scottish  bankers  had  the  great 
advantage  over  their  English  rivals,  that  in  Scotland  farm  leases  ran  from  nineteen 
to  twrnty-one  years,  whereas  in  England  the  farmers  were  mostly  tenants  at  will. 
In  a  small  country  such  as  Scotland  the  circumstances  of  persons  in  trade  were  and 
are  pretty  generally  known  to  bankers,  and  the  applications  for  cash  credits  are 
granted  or  refused  generally  upon  the  personal  knowledge  of  the  bankers  of  the 
entire  sufficiency  of  the  sureties.  In  order  to  obtain  a  wide  circulation  for  their 
notes,  and  in  districts  whence  they  would  not  speedily  return,  the  Scottish  banks 
often  purchased  landed  property  in  distant   counties,  and  also  advanced  money  to 


522  APPENDIX. 

needy  lairds  on  mortgage.  Neither,  scientifically  considered,  was  a  good  banking 
security,  but  they  answered  the  purpose  in  the  infancy  and  growth  of  Scottish 
banking.  The  owner  or  mortgagee  owner  of  land  at  once  had  a  standing  and 
credit  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  property  so  held,  and  the  notes  of  the  bank  for 
wages,  etc.,  were  easily  paid  out  in  those  days  when  railways  were  not,  and  even 
stagecoaches  were  of  rare  occurrence  out  of  the  line  of  the  great  roads  between 
Glasgow,  Edinburgh,  and  London. 

Another  mode  of  circulating  notes  was  by  getting  the  Highland  drovers  to  use 
them  in  their  journeys  with  cattle  from  the  Highlands  to  England.  Robert 
Carrick,  as  he  was  familiarly  called,  who  managed  the  Ship  Bank  with  great  profit 
to  himself  and  his  partners  for  forty-six  years,  from  1775  to  1821,  and  whom  I  well 
recollect,  when  I  was  a  boy,  being  pointed  out  to  me  as  a  very  wealthy  and  very 
miserly  man,  in  his  shabby  carriage,  with  its  scarecrow  driver  and  wretched  horses, 
cultivated  the  acquaintance  of  the  Highland  drovers  with  considerable  assiduity  for 
the  purpose  of  passing  his  banknotes  through  their  agency.  The  following  anec- 
dote illustrates  the  keen  dealing  of  both  banker  and  drover,  the  former,  with  all 
his  eagerness  to  circulate  his  notes  in  the  remote  regions  of  the  Highlands,  being 
equally  determined  not  to  abate  one  jot  of  his  rights  as  a  discounting  banker.  A 
drover  came  into  Mr.  Carrick's  private  room  and  presenting  a  bill  which  wanted 
three  days  of  maturity,  asked  the  cash  for  it.  Carrick  readily  agreed  to  discount 
the  bill,  and  remarked  that  there  was  sixpence  discount  to  be  taken  off. 

"  Na,  na  !"  said  the  Highlander,  "she  maun  hae  a'  t'e  siller." 

"  I  can't  do  that,"  replied  Carrick,  "the  discount  must  be  deducted."  He 
handed  back  the  bill  to  its  owner,  put  on  his  spectacles,  resumed  his  pen,  and 
commenced  writing.  The  Highlander,  getting  outside  the  door,  kept  it  a  little 
ajar,  and  popping  in  his  head,  "  She'll  gie  't  for  a  groat"  (fourpence). 

"  No,  no  !  "  replied  Carrick,  "  it  must  be  sixpence." 

"  Weel,  weel,"  cried  the  drover,  "  if  it  maun  be  sae,  it  maun  be  sae."  So  the 
sixpence  was  deducted  and  the  balance  handed  to  the  drover  in  notes  and  change. 

It  may  be  said,  I  think,  with  great  truth,  that  the  infancy  and  youth  of  Scottish 
agriculture  and  manufactures  were  nourished  and  cherished  chiefly  by  the  private 
banks.  The  manhood  of  these  industries  is  sustained  by  joint-stock  banks  alone, 
there  not  having  been  a  private  bank  of  issue  in  Scotland  for  upwards  of  a  quarter 
of  a  century;  all  have  been  absorbed  by  the  joint-stock  banks. 

The  Commercial  Bank  of  Scotland  was  established  in  Edinburgh  in  181 1,  and 
the  National  Bank  of  Scotland  in  1825,  both  joint-stock  banks,  and  even  remote 
Aberdeen,  as  early  as  1825,  established  a  joint-stock  bank,  under  the  name  of  the 
Aberdeen  Town  and  County  Bank;  but  it  was  not  until  1830  that  the  usually 
enterprising  and  energetic  merchants  of  Glasgow  established  their  first  joint-stock 
banking  institution,  under  the  name  of  the  Union  Bank  of  Glasgow.  Its  estab- 
lishment was  soon  followed  by  that  of  the  Western  Bank  and  others,  but  I  will 
only  trace  the  process  of  absorption  by  the  Union  Bank  of  various  private  banks, 
and  thus  show  the  course  of  all  the  other  banks  in  reference  to  the  private  ones. 

The  Glasgow  Bank,  already  referred  to  as  established  in  1809,  and  the  last 
private  bank  opened  in  Scotland,  absorbed  in  1836  the  Ship  Bank,  the  first  private 


APPENDIX.  523 

bank,  established  in    1750,  and  the  name    of    the    two    associated    banks  became 
thenceforth  the  Glasgow  and  Ship  Bank. 

The  Union  Bank  of  Glasgow  assumed  the  name  of  the  Union  Bank  of  Scotland, 
and  under  that  designation  absorbed,  in  the  order  named,  the  following  private 
banks : 

First.  The  Thistle  Bank  of  Glasgow. 

Second.   The  Paisley  Union  Bank  of  Paisley. 

Third.  Sir  William  Forbes  &  Co.  of  Edinburgh. 

Fourth.  Hunter  &  Co.  of  Ayr. 

Fifth.  The  Glasgow  and  Ship  Bank  of  Glasgow. 

Sixth.  The  Old  Bank  of  Aberdeen. 

In  1828  Sir  Robert  Peel  had  attempted  to  put  an  end  to  the  Scottish  banknote 
circulation,  and  substitute  for  it  Bank  of  England  notes,  without  any  notes  of  a 
lower  denomination  than  fiye  pounds,  while  the  currency  of  Scotland  consisted 
almost  entirely  of  one-pound  notes.  The  Scots  felt  greatly  disgusted  at  the  pro- 
posed change,  as  they  were  perfectly  satisfied  with  their  own  banknote  system, 
had  asked  for  no  change,  and  wanted  none.  Their  national  pride  was  also  arou'^ed, 
feeling,  as  they  did,  that  their  whole  monetary  system  was  to  be  upset  by  an  Eng- 
lish statesman,  apparently  for  no  other  reason  but  that  the  Scottish  system  might 
be  made  uniform  with  that  of  England.  The  national  feeling  found  a  fiiting 
mouthpiece  in  that  greatest  of  Scotsmen,  Sir  Walter  Scott,  who,  under  the  nom  de 
plume  of  Malachi  Malagrowther,  in  the  pages  of  the  Edinburgh  Weekly  Jourrial, 
with  mingled  invective,  sarcasm,  and  wit,  put  an  entire  stop  to  Peel's  project  of 
uniformity. 

After  this  Scottish  banking  was  let  severely  alone  for  eighteen  years  ;  that  is, 
until  after  Peel's  bill  of  1844,  regulating  the  management  of  the  Bank  of  England, 
had  become  law.  It  was  then  determined  that  as  the  note  circulation  could  not  be 
assimilated  with  that  of  England,  the  law  regarding  it  should  be  so  altered  as  to 
give  it  a  tendency  in  the  same  direction.  The  note  circulation,  therefore,  of  each 
bank  of  issue,  as  in  1844,  was  ascertained,  and  to  that  amount  each  bank  was  re- 
stricted in  future,  excepting  that  beyond  that  authorized  amount  any  one  of  the 
existing  banks  might  issue  as  many  notes  as  it  could  circulate  upon  a  gold  basis  ; 
that  is  to  say,  for  every  one  pound  of  notes  issued  beyond  the  authorized  amount  it 
must  have  a  sovereign  in  its  coffers  ;  but  the  one-pound  note  circulation,  thanks  to 
Sir  Walter's  efforts  in  1826,  was  not  otherwise  interfered  with.  No  new  bank  of 
issue  was  allowed  to  be  established  in  Scotland  after  1844.  The  Scottish  banks  are 
now  all  joint  stock  and  of  unlimited  liability  ;  that  is,  the  shareholders,  beyond  los- 
ing the  money  paid  for  their  shares,  in  case  of  failure  of  the  bank,  are  liable  to  the 
utmost  penny  of  their  property,  present  and  future,  to  both  note-holders  and  de- 
positors. From  this  category  of  unlimited  liability  it  is  possible  that  the  Bank  of 
Scotland  may  be  an  exception,  as  previously  stated. 

The  present  banknote  circulation  and  entire  banking  business  of  Scotland  are 
provided  for  by  the  following  eleven  joint-stock  banks,  their  branches  and  sub- 
branches,  as  shown  by  the  following  tables,  made  up  to  December  31,  1873  : 


524                                                    APPENDIX. 

Name  of  Bank. 

No.  of 

Paid  up 

Instituted. 

Partners. 

Branches. 

Capital. 

Bank  of  Scotland,           .... 

1695 

1405 

76 

;^I, 000,000 

Royal  Bank,      ..... 

•     1727 

I412 

lOI 

2,000,000 

British  Linen  Company, 

1746 

1203 

61 

1,000,000 

Commercial  Bank,     .... 

.      1810 

1 1 70 

94 

1,000,000 

National  Bank  of  Scotland, 

1825 

1602 

86 

1,000,000 

Aberdeen  Town  and  County  Bank, 

.      1825 

823 

40 

252,000 

Union  Bank  of  Scotland, 

1830 

1215 

116 

1,000,000 

North  of  Scotland  Bank, 

1836 

1407 

44 

320,000 

Clydesdale  Bank,            .... 

1838 

1378 

76 

900,000 

Caledonian  Bank,       .... 

.      1838 

786 

20 

125,000 

City  of  Glasgow  Bank, 

1839 

1234 

122 

1,000,000 

Paid  up  banking  capital  of  Scotland, 

;^9,597,ooo 

The  authorized  and  actual  circulation  of  notes,  with  the  reserve  of  coin  held  by 
the  foregoing  banks,  as  made  up  on  December  31,  1873,  was  as  follows  : 


Name  of  Bank. 

Bank  of  Scotland,     . 

Royal  Bank,  .... 

British  Linen  Company, 

Commercial  Bank, 

National  Bank  of  Scotland, 

Aberdeen  Town  and  County  Bank, 

Union  Bank  of  Scotland, 

North  of  Scotland  Bank, 

Clydesdale  Bank, 

Caledonian  Bank, 

City  of  Glasgow  Bank, 


The  deposits  in  the  Scottish  banks,  as  given  in  evidence  before  the  Parliamentary 
Committee  on  the  Bank  Acts  in  1858,  were  estimated  at  ^50,000,000  sttrling,  and 
I  think  it  will  be  pretty  safe  to  add  a  million  per  annum  since  that  date.  If 
this  supposition  be  correct  it  would  make  the  deposits  in  the  Scottish  banks  at 
present  in  the  neighborhood  of  ;^66,ooo,ooo,  which  I  a])prehend  is  not  far  from  the 
truth.  The  circulation  of  these  notes  is  now  a  far  less  profitable  operation  to  the 
Scottish  banks  than  it  was  thirty  or  forty  years  ago.  Scotland  has  become  so  per- 
meated by  railways  that  notes  are  very  speedily  returned  to  the  issuing  bank. 

The  poorer  classes  no  longer  hoard  notes,  but  at  once  deposit  them  in  savings 
banks  or  with  the  ordinary  banks  and  their  numerous  branches,  where  the  smallest 
depositors  are  allowed  exactly  the  same  rate  of  interest  as  the  largest  depositors. 

Prior  to  the  panic  of   1857,  when   there  happened  to  be  a  run  on  any  Scottish 

'  The  par  of  exchange  with  England  is  now,  gold,  ^4.8665  per  pound  sterling,  and  $5  gold  per 
pound  is  therefore  a  sufficiently  near  approximation  for  converting  these  tables  into  American  coin. 


Authorized 

Actual  Average 

Average 

Circulation  of 

Circulation  of 

Coin  Held 

.845. 

1872-73. 

1872-73. 

;^343,4l8 

;^644,i87 

;^394.956 

216,451 

684,431 

590,606 

438,024 

539,262 

214,718 

374,880 

727,994 

466,198 

297,024 

551,885 

386,131 

70,133 

179,299 

137,077 

454,346 

761,112 

432,255 

154.319 

286,102 

162,668 

274,321 

516.485 

319.675 

53,434 

94,804 

63,669 

72,921 

611,445 

617,879 

'.^2,749,271 

;^5,  597,006 

^^3.785,832 

APPENDIX.  525 

bank,  its  note-holders  were  quite  satisfied  if  they  got  them  exchanged  for  notes  of 
other  undoubted  banks  ;  but  in  1857  there  was  a  decided  run  lor  gold,  which  had 
to  be  met  by  bringing  gold  from  the  coffers  of  the  Bank  of  England.  This  gold 
was  obtained  by  the  Scottish  banks  selling  securities  in  London  (such  as  consols, 
exchequer  bills,  and  London  bills  of  exchange),  which  were,  of  course,  paid  for  in 
Bank  of  England  notes,  convertible  into  gold  on  demand.  The  Bank  of  England 
complained  of  this  extra  demand  for  gold  from  the  Scottish  banks,  and  the  latter 
proposed  that  in  future  Bank  of  England  notes  should  be  made  a  legal  tender  in 
Scotland  from  all  parties  but  the  Bank  of  England  itself,  as  well  as  in  England,  so 
as  to  obviate  the  necessity  for  bringing  gold  to  Scotland.  To  this,  however,  the 
Bank  of  England  was  opposed,  although  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  it  would  have 
been  placed  in  any  worse  position  by  the  arrangement,  which  apparently  would,  to 
some  extent  at  least,  have  relieved  it  from  a  drain  of  gold  in  times  of  panic.  Of 
the  gold  brought  to  Glasgow  from  London  in  the  worst  week  of  the  panic  of  1857, 
about  a  third  was  sent  back  to  London  the  following  week. 

I  think  it  not  improbable  that  with  its  increased  and  increasing  wealth,  Scotland, 
before  the  end  of  the  century,  will  have  no  notes  below  five  pounds,  its  one-pound 
notes  being  superseded  by  sovereigns,  and  then  will  follow  the  substitution  of  Bank 
of  England  notes  for  its  remaining  paper  currency.  The  note  circulation  of  the 
the  whole  of  Great  Britain  will  then  be  uniform,  and  Sir  Robert  Peel's  fond  dream 
of  1826  be  fully  realized. 

The  highest  dividend  paid  by  any  of  the  joint-stock  Scottish  banks  in  1863  was 
15  per  cent,  per  annum,  by  the  Union  Bank  of  Scotland,  and  the  lowest  9 
per  cent,  per  annum,  by  the  Royal  Bank  ;  the  others  paid  from  10  to  14  per 
cent,  per  annum.  In  general  terms  the  dividends  paid  by  the  Scottish  banks  hardly 
exceed  4  per  cent,  per  annum  on  the  existing  market  value  of  their  shares,  or 
only  about  i  percent,  per  annum  more  than  consols,  and  I  believe  the  Scottish 
people  have  quite  as  much  confidence  in  the  one  security  as  in  the  other.  They 
have  always  had  a  stout  faith  in  their  banks,  bankers,  and  banknotes,  and  they 
have  hitherto  had  good  reason  for  the  faith  that  is  in  them. 

In  1873  the  minimum  rate  of  discount  charged  by  the  Scottish  banks  on  three 
months'  local  bills  ranged  from  2%  per  cent,  on  August  22,  to  9  per  cent,  on 
November  8,  and  beginning  at  5  per  cent  in  January,  it  closed  at  the  same  rate 
in  December.  The  Scottish  banks  charge  about  yi,  per  cent,  per  annum  less  dis- 
count on  bills  domiciled  in  London  than  on  local  bills. 

In  1873  the  interest  charged  by  the  Scottish  banks  to  their  customers  on  cash 
credit  accounts  ranged  from  4^  per  cent,  on  August  22,  to  9  per  cent,  on 
November  8,  and  beginning  at  6j^  per  cent,  in  January,  it  closed  at  5^  per  cent, 
in  December.  In  the  same  period  the  interest  allowed  on  deposits  ranged  from 
2  per  cent,  on  August  22,  to  6  per  cent,  on  November  8,  and  beginning  at  ^]4. 
per  cent,  in   January,  it  closed  at  2i%    per  cent,  in  December,  1873. 

In  Scotland  there  is  a  continuous  and  active  employment  of  the  means  of  the 
banks,  and  the  numerous  blanches  suck  up,  as  it  were,  all  idle  capital  from  numer- 
ous small  depositors  in  the  remoter  provinces  ;  all  beyond  the  moderate  amounts 
which  the  managers  of  the  branches  are   permitted  to  lend  out  on   the   spot,  they 


526  APPENDIX. 

remit  to  the  mother  banks  for  investment  in  the  great  financial  centers,  Glasgow 
and  Edinburgh,  where  there  is  always  an  active  demand  from  borrowers  for  the  pur- 
suits of  commerce,  manufactures,  ship-building,  mining,  and  agriculture. 

The  number  of  ordinary  directors  in  the  existing  Scottish  banks  ranges  from 
seven  to  twelve,  and  it  is  usual  for  two  of  the  directors  to  go  out  annually.  In 
some  of  the  banks,  I  believe  the  outgoing  directors  are  accessible  at  once  ;  in 
others,  two  new  men  must  be  introduced  ;  but  in  a  directory  of  twelve  this  rule  can 
readily  be  adhered  to,  and  yet  a  permanent  staff  of  directors  be  maintained  by 
choosing  from  the  same  body  of  fourteen  men.  Although  the  directors  attend  at 
specified  times  each  week,  and  some  of  them  are  probably  in  the  bank  daily,  yet  the 
manager  or  president  is  de  facto  lord  of  the  ascendant  in  all  ordinary  routine  busi- 
ness ;  and  in  nothing  so  much  as  in  banking  is  this  one-man  power  necessary  for 
success.  Thorough  mastership  of  the  position,  promptitude  of  decision,  and 
honesty  of  purpose  are  of  course  essential  attributes  of  a  good  bank  manager,  and 
in  all  these  elements  the  Scottish  bank  managers,  whether  as  respects  the  old  private 
banks  or  the  modern  joint-stock  ones,  have  very  rarely  proved  deficient. 

I  cannot  conclude  these  remarks  on  Scottish  banking  better  than  by  quoting 
what  Adam  Smith  wrote  on  the  subject  of  banking,  more  than  one  hundred  years 
ago,  and  I  may  say  that  upon  the  principles  therein  enunciated  the  Scottish  banks 
have  almost  uniformly  been  conducted.  These  principles  are  equally  applicable 
now  as  when  predicated  by  Smith,  and  to  this  side  of  the  Atlantic  as  well  as  the 
other  : 

"  Though  the  principles  of  the  banking  trade  may  appear  somewhat  abstruse,  the 
practice  is  capable  of  being  reduced  to  strict  rules.  To  depart  on  any  occasion 
from  these  rules,  in  consequence  of  some  flattering  speculation  of  extraordinary  gain, 
is  almost  always  extremely  dangerous,  and  frequently  fatal  to  the  banking  company 
which  attempts  it.  But  the  constitution  of  joint-stock  companies  renders  them  in 
general  more  tenacious  of  established  rules  than  any  private  company.  Such  compa- 
nies, therefore,  seem  extremely  well-fitted  for  this  trade.  The  principal  banking 
companies  in  Europe,  accordingly,  are  joint-stock  companies,  many  of  which  man- 
age their  trade  very  successfully  without  any  exclusive  privilege.  The  Bank  of 
England  has  no  exclusive  privilege,  except  that  no  other  banking  company  in  Eng- 
land shall  consist  of  more  than  six  persons.  The  two  banks  of  Edinburgh  (Bank 
of  Scotland  and  Royal  Bank)  are  joint-stock  companies  without  any  exclusive 
privileges."  William  Wood. 

ANCESTRY    OF    HELEN    MASON    WOOD. 

Father  thought  it  a  duty  to  preserve  a  record  of  the  ancestry  of  a  family  ;  so  in 
accordance  with  what  I  know  would  have  been  his  wish,  I  set  down  here  some 
notes  of  the  lineage  of  his  widow. 

Paternal  Ancestry. 

John  Mason  (ist)  was  styled  Knight  when  made  Governor  of  the  Royal  Fortress 
and  town   of  Portsmouth,   England,    by   Charles   I.      He   married  Elizabeth,  the 


APPENDIX.  527 

second  daughter  of  Sir  Roger  Sutton  of  Calverlee,  Hanls.  They  had  three  sons 
and  one  daughter  :  John  (2d),  James  (1st),  William,  and  Isabella,  who  married 
Walter  Hunt,  Esq.,  of  Hampshire,  England. 

John  Mason  (ist)  came  to  America  in  1629.  He,  with  Sir  Ferdinando  Gorges, 
had  obtained  a  grant  of  the  whole  extent  of  the  country  included  between  the  sea, 
the  St.  Lawrence,  the  Merrimac,  and  the  Kennebec  Rivers,  and  projected  great 
mercantile  settlements  on  the  Piscataqua.  These  failing  to  succeed,  John  Mason 
obtained  a  new  patent  for  the  country  between  the  Merrimac  and  the  Piscataqua, 
and  under  this  patent  New  Hampshire  was  established.  John  Mason  founded 
settlements,  particularly  the  town  of  Portsmouth,  and  made  two  trips  to  England 
for  colonists.  He  died  in  England  in  1635,  and  after  his  death  New  Hampshire 
was  left  to  take  care  of  itself.  His  three  sons,  John  (2d),  James  (ist),  and  William 
Mason,  came  out  to  America,  hoping  to  take  up  his  work,  but  others  had  stepped 
in,  and  they  could  get  no  control  in  the  country. 

William  went  to  Virginia,  and  from  him  descended  John  Y.  Mason,  long 
Minister  to  France,  and  known  to  history  chiefly  for  being  captured  and  released 
with  Slidell.  (John  Y.  Mason  himself  informed  Mr.  Henry  Mason  of  the  relation- 
ship.)    John  went  to  Massachusetts  and  settled  there. 

James  Mason  (ist)  received,  after  the  restoration  of  Charles  II.,  in  memory  of  his 
father's  "  good  and  faithful  services  "  to  the  unhappy  Queen  of  Charles  I.,  Henri- 
etta Maria  (having  aided  her  in  her  escape  into  France),  a  commission  as  Deputy 
of  the  King's  Province,  or  Colony  of  Rhode  Island,  and  a  grant  of  land  called 
Rehoboth,  where  he  settled  in  1662  or  1663.  He  married  Betsey  Serena  Wanton 
of  Newport.  Their  descendants  are  still  known  as  the  Rehoboth  Masons.  He 
had  three  sons,  George  (ist),  John  (3d),  and  James  (2d). 

John  (3d)  married  Sarah  Brown  of  Providence.  They  had  two  sons,  James  (3d) 
and  John  (4th),  and  one  daughter,  Sarah. 

John  Mason  (4th),  the  great-grandfather  of  Helen  Mason  Wood,  married  Mary 
Pitt  *  (widow  of  a  Mr.  Walker).  He  was  sent  to  Congress  from  Rhode  Island, 
where  he  had  his  country  home,  which  lemained  in  the  possession  of  the  family  for 
over  two  hundred  years. 

Mary  Pitt,  the  wife  of  John  Mason  (4th),  was  married  three  times.  John  Mason, 
the  Congressman,  was  her  second  husband.  By  him  she  had  a  son,  John  (5th), 
and  an  only  daughter,  Sarah.  Sarah  married  a  Mr.  Jone.=,  who  left  a  large  fortune 
to  his  wife's  Mason  relatives.  Mrs.  Mason's  third  husband  was  a  Mr.  Thayer. 
John  Mason  (5th)  went  to  New  York  and  became  a  great  financier,  and  founded 
the  Chemical  Bank  of  New  York,  which  has  proved  a  mine  of  wealth  to  his 
descendants,  for  he  took  his  two  nephews,  John  Q.  and  Joshua  Jones,  into  the 
bank,  and  Joshua  left  his  money  to  his  Mason  and  Schermerhorn  relatives. 

John  Mason  (5th)  married  a  Miss  Clark.  He  died  in  1839  in  his  fifty-fourth 
year,   leaving  to  his   eight   children   a   very  large   fortune.      The  names  of   most 

*  Mary  Pitt  was  of  the  same  family  as  William  Pitt,  first  Earl  of  Chatham.  Her  father,  Richard 
Pitt,  was  one  of  the  Regicides,  and,  like  his  con/riresy  fled  to  America. 


528  APPENDIX. 

of  his  children  are  well  known  in  New  York  as  people  of  solid  wealth  and  good 
social  standing. 

Mary  married  Isaac  Jones. 

Rebecca  married  Isaac  Colford  Jones. 

William  Pitt  died  at  the  age  of  nineteen. 

Helen  married  Joseph  Alston  of  South  Carolina. 

John  died  unmarried. 

Sarah  married  Gordon  Hammersley.* 

James  married  first  Miss  Wheatley,  second  Miss  Voung, 

Henry  married  Lydia  Lush  James. 

Maternal  A)!cestr}'. 

Samuel  Stringer  married  Lydia  Warfield  of  Baltimore,  Md.  Samuel  Stringer  f 
of  Baltimore,  Md.,  married  Rachel  Van  der  Heyden.  j.  Lydia  Stringer  married 
Stephen  Lush.||  Gertrude  Stringer  Lush  married,  first,  Robert  James  ;  second,  Wil- 
liam Ellery  Ross  ;  Lydia  Lush  James  married  Henry  Mason.  They  had  five  chil- 
dren, of  whom  Lydia  S.  Mason  married  Heyward  Cutting  ;  Helen  Mason  married 
William  Wood  ;  Gertrude  Mason  married  Lewis  Manning  Brown  ;  Serena  Mason 
married  Lewis  Mortimer  Carnes  ;   Henry  died  unmarried. 

*  The  Hammersley  will  case  concerned  a  portion  of  the  great  INIason  and  Jones  fortune. 

t  Samuel  Stringer  was  born  in  Maryland  in  1734  ;  died  in  Albany,  N.  Y.,  July  11,1817.  In  1755, 
Governor  Shirley  appointed  him  to  the  Medical  Department  of  the  Provincial  army.  At  the  close 
of  the  war  he  married  and  settled  in  Albany.  In  1775  he  was  appointed  Director-General  of  the 
hospitals  in  the  Northern  Department  under  General  Schujder,  and  accompanied  the  troops 
that  invaded  Canada. 

X  Rachel  Van  der  Heyden  was  the  daughter  of  Jacob  Van  der  Heyden,  last  patroon  of  Troy,  who 
died  1708.  The  first  Van  der  Heyden  who  came  out  from  Holland  reached  here  in  1610.  Jacob 
Van  der  Heyden  married  Janet  Livingston,  daughter  of  John  Livingston  and  Catherine  Ten 
Broek;  John  Livingston  was  the  son  of  Robert  Livingston,  Jr.  and  Margaretta  Schuyler.  From 
this  pair  are  also  descended  William  Wood's  Kane  grandchildren.  Jacob  Van  der  Heyden's  son, 
Jacob,  in  177S  purchased  what  was  known  in  Albany  as  the  "  Van  der  Heyden  Palace,"  a  large 
building  with  two  gables  in  front.  It  stood  in  North  Pearl  Street  just  below  Maiden  Lane,  on  a  site 
afterward  occupied  by  a  Baptist  Church.  The  old  mansion  figures  in  Irving's  "  Bracebridge  Hall  " 
as  the  residence  of  Antony  Van  der  Heyden,  but  Jacob  was  the  real  owner,  and  lived  there  till  his 
death  in  1820.  The  iron  vane  on  the  peak  of  one  of  its  gables  was  transferred,  when  the  house  was 
pulled  down  in  1833,  to  Irving's  house  of  "  Sunnyside,"  whose  gable  was  copied  from  the  Van  der 
Heyden  house.     The  Van  der  Heyden  house,  however,  was  built  by  Johannes  Beekman  in  1725. 

II  Stephen  Lush  was  born  in  New  York  in  1753.  He  studied  law  under  William  Smith,  author  of 
a  history  of  New  York,  and  afterward  Chief  Justice  of  Lower  Canada.  Lush  began  to  practice  in 
New  York  in  May,  1774,  and  afterward  removed  to  Albany.  When  the  struggle  for  independence 
began,  he  entered  the  family  of  the  commander-in-chief,  as  military  secretary  and  aid.  He  was 
captured  at  the  storming  of  Fort  Montgomery  ;  was  imprisoned  both  on  a  prison  ship  and  in  the 
"  Sugar  House  ";  exchanged  after  a  parole  on  Long  Island  following  the  capture  of  Burgoyne  ;  again 
became  military  secretary,  and  served  to  the  close  of  the  war.  Returning  to  civil  life  he  devoted 
himself  to  the  practice  of  law.  He  died  at  the  age  of  seventy-two,  in  April,  1825,  leaving  a  high 
reputation  for  integrity,  benevolence,  and  learning. 


DATE  DUE 

IP*  r"  I*'    —    ^ 

FEB 

1  '    -^ 

' 

PrlnlM 
In  USA 

COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY  LIBRARIES 


0044145624 


92W8537 


^\}^  Z  'I   t953 


V.2 


■^  _;*'■ 


